Hyperdimension Neptunia: God Wars - Anicent Grudge
by Ramillies
Summary: An unsuspecting Gameindustri is about to face something never witnessed before - a male CPU (Computer Patron Unit). New friends and foes. Battles waged like nothing the goddesses have seen before will test them to their limits to protect their lands. Game rules don't apply in the real world, something they will need to get over if they are to survive what is to come.
1. Prologue

**Hyperdimension Neptunia: God Wars - Ancient Grudge**

Disclaimer: Hyperdimension Neptunia is owned by Idea Factory (for EU and US releases on the Playstation 3, Playstation 4 and PC), Compile Heart (for Japan releases) and Felistella (for PS Vita releases). All characters that appear in this story that have appeared in any game and/or the anime are NOT owned by me, nor do I claim ownership of said characters.

However, any character that does appear in this story that HAS NOT appeared in the games or anime is owned by me and is an entirely fictional character and not based on any person, living or dead. Any likenesses are purely coincidental.

 **Synopsis:** Have you ever wondered why there are goddesses protecting nations across various dimensions? How about why there are goddesses but no gods? For every female, there must be a male counterpart and vice versa, but what if there is a dark story behind this? What if Neptune and company have to deal with a god - something none of them have ever conceived the notion of. And what if this god harbours a grudge against all goddesses? What will become of Gamindustri if said god appears before our favourite CPUs?

* * *

Prologue: Death of Our Home

 _Hatred, anger, rage._

A small aircraft carrier floated in the calm sea. It was an odd design - One launch pad for four aircraft that had VTOL (Vertical Take-Off and Landing) abilities, which were moved onto the launch pad via the pad itself lowering into the ship's hull. The aircraft were moved across on a pulley system where the pad would be raised onto the flight deck where they could launch. At the back of the ship was a large hangar door where amphibious vehicles could launch from - another four of those.

The ship boasted a powerful medium range dual firing laser cannon on top. The laser was on a turret fixing, allowing it to rotate 360 degrees around and directly up, but only 45 degrees below, so it would avoid firing on itself. The carrier also is armed with powerful flares to aid in defence against missile strikes and has a warhead launcher of its own. The launcher has a unique drone launch which effectively fires a drone camera high into the sky from which the warhead targeting is connected to by radar. The camera allows for a target to be selected on an interface screen within the carrier which the warhead will they launch and impact against.

The one beauty of this carrier? It can be operated by a single person. Everything is fully automated within the ship, even the fabrication of replacement parts and repairs are automated. The ship also is fitted with a special radar, one that detects interstellar travel. Like now, for instance.

A warning light flashes within the carrier. On the screen, text filters through.

 **INTERSTELLAR WARP TRAVEL DETECTED. TARGET LOCATION THEORISED. IMMEDIATE EVACUATION ADVISED. FORWARDING MESSAGE TO CENTRAL COMMAND.**

The message is received.

"My Lord! Message from _Epsilon_! They are coming!"

 _Butchery, evisceration, torture._

"How long until they arrive?"

 _Anguish, despair...regret. Pain...suffering._

"No more than one hour and ten minutes until their fleet drops out of warp drive. After that, I suspect it will take them about half an hour to get into position."

 _I have witnessed atrocities and bloody murders committed. Over the centuries I have done the exact same thing too._

"Sound the evacuation. Get as much through the warp portal as possible."

"But, my Lord! Our world..."

"It is lost! If we do not leave we will all be slaughtered! _She_ has spent many decades gathering shares from across various dimensions and worlds in order to attack us today. _Her_ forces are too vast for us to possibly defeat...I care about our world too, but we must go! Why do you think I ordered this planet to be strip mined of natural resources over forty years ago? I had to prepare for this day to come."

"Yes, sir..."

"She will not stop if she slays me. All of you who follow me, you'll be her next targets. We have to leave for the world of Gamindustri if we are to rebuild and destroy her."

"But...there are four goddesses there already. Surely somewhere else..."

"NO! Gamindustri is the best world for us to settle on. Those four CPUs and their Candidate sisters are nowhere near as strong combined as _she_ is. We haven't spent years building a settlement there already to just give up and go somewhere else!"

"Yes, my Lord. The evacuation...has been sounded."

"Good. Activate the automated defences and get my carrier through the sea portal, then destroy it. We can't allow anyone to know where we have gone. Divert all available power to the force field around the power plant - the longer those automated defences are active, the more we can evacuate. Those who are too far away, unfortunately are already dead. Tell them to evacuate or fight. It is a horrible fate for them, but one that is unavoidable."

"What will you do about her, my Lord?"

"Meet her in battle, of course. Delaying her advance will aid us more than anything else could do."

* * *

Location: Oil refinery fifteen kilometres from base portal.

 _"Sixty triple nine, you are clear for departure. You have permission to disregard the fifteen mile per hour speed limit and go at twenty-five. One clear, go as fast as possible!"_

"Roger tower. departing now. Good luck."

The driver of 60999 looked out of his driver cab window at the approaching monstrous vessel that hung in the sky. A veritable fortress of unfathomable power, only heard from the stories of Lord Grey Heart himself. A chill ran down his spine as the ship loomed ever larger. He had to get through to the portal, not only for himself, but this locomotive was a personal favourite of Lord Grey Heart, not to mention the thousands of gallons of refined oil it was hauling too. Losing this cargo would be a bitter blow to the god.

 _'Just need to make it into the tunnel and then I'll be clear for most of the journey.'_

The trip between the refinery and the portal consisted of a one kilometre tunnel followed by a six kilometre deep cutting which would help protect the train from unwanted visitors, however, once the cutting finished it was flat terrain until the portal where there was some very minor hill cover, against ground targets but not airborne. The only protection until then was just prayer that the enemy would be too busy to realise what was rumbling down the line at 80 miles-per-hour.

The driver opened the cab side window and looked behind him to see when the final tank wagon was clear of the points. There were three other locomotives there but none were ready for departure. As the final wagon rolled onto the main exit track, the driver throttled up and sighed. A feeling of guilt overcoming him, knowing that everyone behind him would be dead shortly.

The roar of airborne engines started to fill his ears, shortly by the sounds of bullets being fired. It had begun.

 _The field of battle. How I hate this. My beloved planet is in its death throes._

* * *

"Give it up, Grey Heart! Die like the mongrel of a god you are!"

"Crimson Heart, you are the biggest scum I've ever laid eyes on. Goddesses are nothing more than warmongers! Your life will end soon, I shall avenge the gods that you butchered centuries ago!"

The clash of swords echoed, followed by the sounds of lasers firing and missiles being launched in the background.

"I'll give you credit for evading me for so long. You knew I'd find you eventually, but your planet is doomed now! I'll wipe all of you out in one attack! I'll tear your precious planet apart and those who don't die can freeze to death!"

"You think that big hulk of metal you call a spaceship can break a planet apart? What do you plan to do? Crash it into my planet?"

"Ha ha ha ha! No, you bumbling old fool. While searching for you, I came across some wonderful weapon plans in another dimension. I'm going to launch a warhead of vast destructive power right into the largest volcano. I've known you have been here for the last decade, so I had my scientists run hundreds of simulations and that is the one to aim for. The explosion will cause a massive tectonic destabilisation and literally shake your planet to pieces and leave it a broken, icy husk! With all your followers dead, you'll have no shares and your powers will wane, leaving you defenceless for me to slay!"

"Are you mad? You'll kill everyone here! You'd go so far as to kill your own followers just to have a chance at taking me out?"

Metal clashed repeatedly as the two CPUs fought each other.

"If needs must. A few troops lost on my side pales compared to finishing off the last god in existence. You are a relic of a past era, one that should have ended thousands of years ago, and I intend to finish it this very day!"

There was an ominous firing sound from above. As Grey Heart looked up, he could see the smoke trail of a large missile heading towards the volcano that Crimson Heart had talked about.

"You are everything I despise about goddesses! You show why your kind can never be trusted! The gods gave you all the benefit of the doubt for so long...perhaps committing genocide against your kind would have been the better evil for the greater good of the entire universe."

It was an intense affair. As the two CPUs battled each other, the automated defences were working overtime in keeping the goddess' forces at bay from attempting to lay siege to portal. Grey Heart would take any opportunity presented to him to aid the defences with snap shots using his laser rifle. Each time he attacked something else, however, it would momentarily leave him vulnerable to attack from the goddess.

Out of the corner of his vision, Grey Heart saw movement - something long moving relatively fast along the ground. Given no defences attacked it, it had to be something that had escaped from Crimson Heart's forces further afield. Stealing glances, he was able to make out the black tank wagons - an oil train. No doubt filled with refined oil from the refinery down the line. Earlier he had seen a large explosion from the general direction of the oil refinery and presumed everyone had perished.

Crimson Heart lunged forwards, Grey Heart rolled and smacked her down to the ground. He quickly checked the device on his arm - a timer - and it showed three minutes and thirteen seconds left. The timer was counting down until the power plant had burned through all the coal left in the stockpile and the shield generator would be forced to deactivate in order to keep the defences online.

A few roaring noises overhead caused Grey Heart to look at the sound. Several of Crimson Heart's airborne attackers were aiming for the oil train. Grey Heart chased after them, firing his laser rifle in an attempt to destroy, or at least make them break off their attack run. One laser blast sheared the tail off one of the fighters which inevitably caused the pilot to lose control and the plane smashed into the ground and exploded. A few of the remaining drone fighters engaged several more of the attackers and a nearby flak cannon started taking shots at the rest. One flak shell exploded right next to the cockpit, killing the pilot outright and caused his plane to lurch to the right and descend where it crash-landed.

Despite the best efforts of Grey Heart's forces, a couple of fighters started unleashing bullets onto the tanker wagons. The thick protective metal was able to withstand the bullets on most of the wagons as the planes used strafing runs to try and find a weak point. Crimson Heart re-engaged Grey Heart and the two CPUs clashed again as the defending forces began to dwindle. One of the tank wagons on the oil train was eventually punctured and oil began pouring out along the side of the track. Shortly afterwards a second and third wagon were punctured and more oil sprayed out alongside the track.

The timer reached zero and the shield surrounding the coal plant died down. A second timer activated, set at fifty three seconds. When this reaches zero, the coal plant will have run out of coal to burn, meaning all defences will go silent. Grey Heart glanced at the massive cooling towers to see there being a distinct lack of smoke being billowed out of them.

A quick plan formulated in his mind - he managed to get Crimson Heart between himself and the oil train and, with well aimed shot from his laser rifle, fired at the goddess. She deftly swayed out of the way and the shot travelled towards the train and collided with the coupling between the last undamaged tank wagon and the first damaged tank wagon, destroying the coupling.

The last of the fighters were shot down by the flak cannon mere seconds before all the defences went dark. With the train safe, albeit with just over half of the cargo it was pulling, he focused on using the remaining wagons to escape. The train made it through the portal in a sea of noise; screeching brakes pulled to the emergency braking setting to be precise.

Grey Heart thrust his sword forwards to make the goddess block. With his rifle he shot off one of her shoulder processor units and then slammed his adversary into the ground. While it was tempting to try and finish her off now, time was not on his side as he flew over to the remaining tank wagons and shot at the wheels to derail them so they wouldn't get through the portal. There was a loud rumble followed by a violent shake, one that persisted for a good half a minute. In his original plan, he would have set off explosives to destroy the portal as he went through it before the power plant expired, but now he picked up the crude explosive device and tossed it into the small pool of oil that was now forming next to the portal. Armed with his sword, he slashed open all the tank wagons to create a huge pool of refined oil.

"Farewell, you bitch. Mark my words - you WILL fall the next time we meet."

Crimson Heart recovered to see the god fire at the pool of oil as he flew through the portal, igniting the oil as he disappeared, the inter-dimensional travel structure shutting down afterwards and the explosives detonating in the raging inferno, turning the portal into nothing more than a memory in a giant crater.

"Dammmmmnnnnn youuuuuuuuuu!" Crimson Heart roared as loud as she could.

* * *

Grey Heart landed on Gamindustri and observed his new surroundings and was quickly approached by members of his military command group.

"What happened, my Lord? What was that earthquake?"

"That damn bitch destroyed the planet. The plate tectonics were ripped apart and the planet has shaken itself apart. I guess the earthquake passed through the portal..."

"Yes, my Lord. Good thing all our buildings here are made to resist earthquakes, otherwise we'd be in serious trouble."

"The buildings might be fine, but the vehicles aren't. Get every vehicle upright and put all construction efforts into our defences. If those tremors were felt on this planet, then it will be only a matter of time before the goddesses here find us. What nation is closest to us?"

"Planeptune, my Lord. Despite this though, our agents are certain that it will be Leanbox's CPU that will come here first. Lastation is a bit further away while Lowee is a long way away from us."

"Okay, get me all the info you have on Leanbox's and Planeptune's CPUs. I must be ready to face one or both of them in battle when they inevitably arrive."

 _'Four goddesses live here. Heh, either I'm a complete fool or a genius. Time will tell on that front. Sooner or later, time will tell.'_

To Be Continued.


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter 1: The Goddess Council

"Ah, what a wonderful day. The sun is shining brightly, my shares are at an all time high...and I have the next four days to myself to work on my never ending backlog of games. Life as a CPU has never been better." Vert sighed happily to herself.

The Goddess of Leanbox, sporting her favourite dress, flexed her fingers before putting her headphones on her head and adjusting the microphone attachment so it was perfectly just away from her mouth. She picked up her controller and turned her console and television on.

"A good nine hour stint of Four Goddesses Online Two shall be a good way to start my day. The only thing that could make this better would be if Nepgear became my little sister."

As 4 Goddesses Online 2 loaded up, Vert rubbed her chin.

"Well, now that I have some time to myself, I would not be surprised at all if something were to happen to ruin my peace. I realise this isn't a game this time, but a story instead, but it wouldn't be much of a story without some kind of plot to it other than me playing games all day and night."

Vert waited for a few minutes for the plot advancement but...

"Nothing? No call from Histoire or anything? Hmm, maybe the writer forgot to add in the plot? Or...this isn't...going to be one of those...'M' rated graphic sex stories is it? A lady of such fine class such as myself should never be in one of those. A little bit of fanservice for my adoring fans, yes, but nothing more."

A chill ran down Vert's spine as she thought about all the graphic details that could be listed about her body, especially her ample bre-

A loud rumble distracted the writer from what he was thinking. I mean, distracted Vert from her thoughts. Her room started shaking and she had to grab hold of her television and console to stop them from crashing onto the floor. Since she couldn't be everywhere at once, she had to let everything else fall.

"Whoa! So the plot has finally arrived."

The tremors didn't last long, much to Vert's relief. She was able to steady her beloved console and television before standing up and dusting herself off.

 _'Unfortunately, gaming will have to wait for now as getting a report of the damage done from my Basilicom staff takes higher priority. What a pain it will be to have to sort everything else out when I return.'_

* * *

When Vert reached the briefing room in her Basilicom, there was already a call from Histoire, with Noire and Blanc linked in too.

 _"I am glad you are here, Vert."_ Histoire smiled at the Leanbox CPU.

"Nice to see you all again. I suspect that Neptune is too busy lazing to join us?" Vert asked as she raised an eyebrow.

 _"Hey! I can hear you Vert!"_ Neptune's voice called from afar.

 _"More or less."_ Histoire replied as she sighed.

 _"Enough talking about Neptune. We've got actual work on our hands here, y'know."_ Noire huffed.

 _"Agreed. Neptune can wait. She wouldn't be any help to us anyway."_ Blanc mocked the Planeptune CPU.

"You've all felt the earthquake as well, yes?" Vert asked the others.

All of them nodded.

 _"Ruined my game, it did!"_ Neptune shouted _. "I was making amazing progress and I lost all the data before I got to a save point!"_

There was a few seconds of silence, the other CPUs just blinking at their respective screens before a collective roll of the eyes and a perfectly synchronised sigh.

 _"This is worrying. Gamindustri is a completely tectonically stable planet. Natural earthquakes do not happen here, so there is only speculation about how this has happened."_ Histoire explained.

 _"Well, natural earthquake or not, seeing to our citizens needs comes first, followed by repairs and rebuilding."_ Noire stated.

 _"I believe it would be best for us to leave the investigation of this to IF and her contacts until everything else has been sorted out."_ Histoire suggested.

 _"Agreed. We all know IF has contacts in all of our nations, and she is the best suited to lead an investigation. Her aid will be invaluable."_ Blanc nodded in approval of Histoire's suggestion.

 _"No problem with that here."_ Noire gave her approval.

"I agree too. Iffy is of invaluable assistance to all of us in times of need. Oh, how I wish she were under my employ with her skill set. That and having dear Nepgear as my beloved little sister, then my world would be complete." Vert gushed as she clapped her hands together.

There was another round of eye rolling and sighing, accompanied by Neptune seemingly doing her impression of Darth Vader's cry of "No!"

 _"Neptune, please! You are going to make me deaf at this rate!"_ Historie scolded the Planeptune goddess.

 _"By, the way, Histoire. I know I'm probably making a mistake in asking this, but what is Neptune ACTUALLY doing?"_ Noire asked as she rubbed her temples.

Histoire turned her head to look at Neptune before turning back.

 _"It seems her console fell off the table it was sitting on during the earthquake and I presume it has suffered some kind of minor damage as Neptune as currently trying to fix it."_ Histoire sighed.

 _"Would be easier if Nep Junior was here!"_

Noire massaged her temples again as she unleashed a frustrated sigh.

 _"For goodness sake, Neptune! You are a damn goddess! Stop screwing around and focus here! Your nation, my nation and Vert's nation will all have suffered more damage and we have to ensure our citizens have come to no harm and help organise any repair efforts that are needed. Stop messing about with your games all the time!"_

Noire's outburst wasn't exactly unexpected. Vert and Blanc could sympathise with Noire over the frustration that Neptune could create without actually having to try that hard at all.

A few moments later, Neptune appeared on the screen next to Histoire.

 _"Oh come on, Noire! You are overreacting again. Chill out and relax! I'll help my people out, I always do. As soon as Nep Junior returns we'll have Planeptune back in pristine condition before you guys have sorted out your places."_

 _"Translation: When Nepgear returns, she'll do all the work and Neptune will bugger about and take all the credit."_ Blanc stated flatly.

 _"Yep."_

"Agreed."

Both Noire and Vert nodded their heads at Blanc's statement.

 _"That ain't fair! Three on one. You girls are ganging up on me like you always do. I do plenty of work around here!"_ Neptune whined.

 _"No, Neptune, you don't."_ Histoire sighed.

 _"Hey, Histy! What gives?"_

 _"Nothing 'gives', Neptune. We will have a long chat about your attitude later on, after you have done some work helping your own citizens. Everyone else, we shall have another meeting like this in twenty-four hours time and this time, Neptune, you WILL be in attendance from the start and not just in the vicinity."_

Histoire disconnected Planeptune from the video feed, leaving the other three goddesses.

 _"So, I assume Histoire will relay orders to IF?"_ Noire asked.

"Let us assume so. Interrupting Histoire now wouldn't be of benefit to any of us." Vert suggested.

 _"Agreed. We'll speak tomorrow then."_ Blanc stated and immediately cut Lowee off from the video feed.

"Not so much as a 'goodbye'. Farewell, Noire, I bid you good day and wish your nation has not suffered badly." Vert offered a smile to Noire before cutting the feed.

Vert took a deep breath and pulled her phone out. She dialled Chika's number.

 _"My darling Vert! How may I help you?"_ Chika's delighted voice filled Vert's ear.

"Chika, I require assistance in organising repair efforts and aid to Leanbox in the aftermath of that nasty earthquake."

 _"I suspected as much. Don't worry, I'm already on the case!"_

"Wonderful. I know I can rely on you to get things organised for me." Vert beamed happily.

 _"Anything for my beloved sister."_

"I'll be in my room if you need me." Vert hung up.

 _'Now, I need to take inventory of my collection of games and make sure none of my gaming platforms are damaged.'_

Despite all the other goddesses taunting Neptune about her work ethic, they themselves certainly were not rushing to their own nations aid. As you have just read, Vert is checking on her games and gaming platforms, Blanc feels the need to check over all of her books (yes, every SINGLE one, page by page. All this despite the fact that Lowee only got minor tremors and thus any damage wouldn't be in any way extensive), and Noire has shut herself in her now rather vast closet while she closely inspects all of her cosplay outfits for any signs of damage. Of course, the best way to do with if by actually wearing them, which of course takes longer to check each one.

"Pfft. And they say I don't do any work. They are complete hypocrites I tells ya! " Neptune moaned with her fourth wall breaking skills.

* * *

Like many people on Gamindustri, IF had experienced the earthquake firsthand. She received a call from Histoire asking her to return to Planeptune and a directive to investigate the area the earthquake had come from. While returning, IF had been busy making lots of calls to her information ring and ordering people to various locations throughout the planet.

Upon her return to the Planeptune Basilicom, she had been knee-deep in reports via text, e-mail and phone from various agents of all four nations plus her own group. National emergencies like this did give her a chance to build up her own information portfolio of who was working for what nation and a general idea of each nation's budget (just in case...). Information was key to a lot of things.

 _'In a way, that General Affimojas was not wrong about using information as his method to wage war. They do say that the pen is mightier than the sword, though these days it might be more accurate to replace the pen with the index finger. Can't imagine Noire or Nep agreeing that their swords can be outdone by information though.'_ IF mused as she checked through all her phones.

"Ah, IF. I'm glad I found you." The soft tone of Histoire's voice filled IF's ears.

IF raised her head to see the pint sized fairy levitating in front of her.

"Hey, Histoire. Anything I can do for you?"

"I was wondering what the latest is from your contacts? The sooner I can send a complete document to other Oracles, the sooner we can start finding out what happened at the epicentre of the earthquake."

"I've already got two agents heading to the area as we speak. Their last message said it might take anywhere from a few hours to a day or two to get a full report, pending on what they find, plus the fact it will take them the best part of the rest of the day to get down there." IF explained as she tapped a finger on her chin. "Probably tomorrow afternoon maybe?"

"I see. I will relay what you have said to the other Oracles." Histoire turned and started to leave. "Oh, and IF?"

"Yeah?"

"Would you please phone Nepgear and find out what she is exactly doing? She should have returned by now and I'm worried she has got sidetracked by finding something mechanical to fawn over...again."

IF watched the Oracle leave and then sighed as she looked at the phone screen in her hand.

 _'You know, in a way, Nepgear is just like Neptune. Thankfully her work ethic is much better than Nep's but she still lets Nep take advantage of her.'_

As IF dialled Nepgear's number, she started running through reports from a number of Lastation agents.

 _'Man, I can't WAIT to finish these...'_

* * *

Several hours had passed. Nepgear had indeed found something mechanical - or rather machine parts and electronics - to fawn over. However, she had been busy fawning when the earthquake had hit and several parts had suffered some minor damage, but it was enough for Nepgear to take matters into her own hands and spend time repairing the parts, mumbling the whole time about how they could be used in making a giant robot and the like. After she had answered IF's call (and apologised several hundred times for being completely AWOL) she had returned home to grovel at Histoire, stating that while she had been distracted, she HAD been helping the machine shop recover from the damage. Histoire did let her off with a light scolding for getting sidetracked, but gave her some praise for helping out the shop, with 'help' being something that Neptune had yet to do so far.

"Stop picking on me! I'ma help my people after I've had some pudding to power me up!" Nep raged, breaking the fourth wall again.

This is my story, Neptune. I call it how I see it with you.

In all seriousness, at this juncture, it was the Candidates and Oracles that had done the most work to help their respective nations. IF wanted to go and scout out the area where the earthquake had originated from herself, but given the time of day, the fact that a couple of agents were already on their way there and she had to compile an updated report for Histoire to give to the other nations for tomorrow, she couldn't go.

As much as she trusted all her contacts and various agents, seeing things with her own eyes was better for her to grasp a situation.

 _'Perhaps I can go tomorrow if I can get everything ready for Histoire in the morning.'_ She thought.

Though, for IF, someone else had already decided on making a visit to the area herself.

"IT CANNOT BE TRUE! MY MOST BELOVED PC GAME IS DAMAGED! MY MOST PRIZED NAKED BUTLER GAME CD HAS GOT A CRACK IN IT!"

Hell hath no fury like a gaming otaku goddess enraged...

"VENGEANCE WILL BE MINE!"

To Be Continued.


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Discovery

 _'Finally! All done at last.'_

"Heeeeeey Iffy! Are you done being a bore chore yet? I wanna get this dumb meeting done with ASAP so I can get back to gaming. I mean, helping my citizens out."

IF sighed as Neptune plonked herself down next to the brunette agent.

"Yes, Nep. I'm done...typing the report. I still need to send it to Histoire before the meeting can begin, though. Just wait a few more minutes and I'm sure things can then start." IF explained wearily.

"Aw geez. Maybe I should phone Nep Junior and ask her to get me some sweets before I die of starvation. Seriously, it's waaaaaaaaaayyy past lunchtime!" Neptune moaned.

"For goodness sake, Nep, it's still morning! Now stop bothering me or the meeting will just take longer and longer."

"Wow, you're being such a grump, Iffy. You act just like Lonely Heart does sometimes." Neptune mocked IF. "Oh! And if any of you readers are wondering who 'Lonely Heart' is, then shame on you for reading stories before playing the games! **That** is my affectionate nickname for our beloved Noire - Black Heart. By the way, if you like me, be sure to buy ALL the games where _**I**_ am the protagonist of. They're really cool. I guarantee that you will enjoy all the shenanigans we get up to all the time. Just keep your fan service shots to an acceptable level, okay? We have feelings too, y'know."

"Nep! Stop with the fourth wall breaking crap! Seriously!"

"Fine, I'm outta here. Just get that done as soon as, Iffy, or I really will pass out from boredom or hunger."

("I'd finally get some peace and quiet if you did.") IF muttered quietly.

"Hmm? Did you say something Iffy?"

"Huh? Oh, no. Just...complaining that...one agent still hasn't given me his report yet, that's all."

Neptune shrugged and skipped off, no doubt to raid the fridge for food of the pudding variety. Neptune's ability to consume several times her own weight in pudding is second to none, which IF only has had the misfortune to witness a mere 45 times. Out of 77 times Neptune has done it. In the past two months.

In icy chill ran down IF's spine as she felt she was being forced to think about it. On the plus side, everything was ready and Histoire will have her report ready to give to the other CPUs.

"Finally, now I can think about heading out as well."

In a way, IF was looking forward to her own personal scouting mission. It had been a while since she had gone solo, especially without anyone actually knowing where she was going.

 _'Maybe I should tell Histoire...'_

* * *

The repair efforts at Grey Heart's base were complete. Defences had been constructed and Observation Posts erected in an attempt to spot approaching enemies to prevent any surprise attacks.

Agent Simmons of the Lastation Special Ops Division was gobsmacked by what he saw through his binoculars. This base had to have been here for quite a long time - there was just no way that all of this could have been built in a few years never mind a few days.

 _'How? How can this have been missed? The pollution from this primitive power plant can be seen from several miles away, not to mention that this base covers quite a large area - several miles at a guess. I need to report this directly to Lady Black Heart and IF. If I had been given the latest camera technology, I could get so many shots to go with this, but given the severity of this situation, and the outdated one I have, I'll have to make do with a few instead.'_

Simmons took a shot of the power plant, the extensive freight yard with a zoomed in shot of track ending in front of some kind of structure, a few military watchtowers and the single naval vessel stationed just off the shore. He switched back to his binoculars and focused on a small group of people. One man was receiving reports (probably, Simmons guessed) from the other military uniformed personnel. The one receiving the probable reports was not wearing a uniform, but he was noticeably wearing protective clothing.

 _'This guy must be the leader.'_

As Simmons thought this, the man stopped and looked around. Then looked directly at Simmons and squinted. Simmons felt a shiver run down his spine and a feeling of dread washed over him, making him feel scared.

 _'Shit! I'm getting out of here now. He can't have seen me at this distance. No way. But that isn't what my body is telling me!'_

Simmons moved as quickly and as quietly as he could as he attached a cable between his phone and camera and started copying the images across. He'd never tried to send reports while running for his life before, but he felt like this is what he is exactly doing right now...

* * *

"What is it, my Lord?"

"I feel like...we are being watched, Major Mason." Grey Heart answered the Major.

The Major and other gathered military personnel stood in silence and waited. Grey Heart looked around before looking up at the cliff off to his left.

"Over there. A spy." The god calmly told his followers.

"Shall we dispatch some troops to hunt the spy down?" The Major asked.

"No, I shall see to him. I will use a Manta."

"My Lord, what about the council that is taking place in the next few minutes? Our agents in Planeptune have hacked in to the terminal so we can hear everything they talk about, though no video feed is available yet." One of the other officers, General Brodrick, reminded the god.

"You and Major Mason can see to that, I will listen to it later. I trust you two to act accordingly to the information we will get." Grey Heart smiled as he laid a hand on each of the officers shoulders.

With that, the god activated HDD and flew to his carrier, leaving the others to follow out their orders.

"Let us get to the command bunker, Major. We have a meeting to spy on."

* * *

"Thank you all for attending this meeting...Erm...Chika? Where is Vert?" Histoire asked, noticing the feed from Leanbox was missing the guardian CPU.

 _"Well, I'm afraid to report that my dear Vert found her favourite PC game CD has been severely damaged! Oh, it was just horrible having to witness the crushed, sad look on her face. I felt myself die a bit inside when I saw how heartbroken Vert was. I did my best to console her, but it was to no avail. Oh the tragedy!"_

 _"Okay, Chika, most of what you said is a load of BS. Could you stop exaggerating and actually tell us where Vert is?"_ Noire's left eye twitched in frustration.

 _"Hmpf. I'll have you know that Vert was unhappy about it and she, despite my protests, has gone off in a fit of rage to where the earthquake came from."_

"What is she gonna do? The quake is over! Not like she can carve up the landscape and punish the planet for it." Neptune shrugged her shoulders.

"Well, in regards to what she'll find, the reports that have been filed by our agents indicate that monster levels seem to dropped and are almost non-existent near the epicentre. One Lastation agent seemed to seriously suggest about some kind of extinction event on monsters taking place, but IF has put that down to some crazy talk, most likely spawned from being chewed out by Noire too much over virtually nothing. According to IF at any rate." Histoire started working her way through the report.

 _"Uh. Wha? I-I do NOT chew people out over minor things!"_ Noire protested.

"Of course you do. Don't you remember that poor guard in Victory? You fired him for pretty much just following your orders." Neptune countered.

 _"Hey! That was my other self, not me! And I'm sure he deserved it! I mean, that Noire may not be me, but she is me and thus is the best CPU for the job over there and is obviously the reason why that dimension doesn't fall apart."_

Silence followed as everyone rolled their eyes at Noire's reasoning.

 _"Well, I'm sure in your head that made perfect sense but not anyone else's. Just a bunch of crap coming out of your mouth anyone could see that it is the other me over there that is the real reason."_ Blanc mocked the Lastation CPU.

 _"There is no crap comin' outta my mouth! You want me to head on over and smack you down, Blanc? And if you forgot, your other self LOST badly to my other self."_

 _"By all means, I'll slap you around so much that your pigtails will be strewn all over Gamindustri! Don't forget your newbie other self had the help of Plutia and Neptune. It was a totally unfair fight!"_

" **ENOUGH**!"

All listening jumped at the exceedingly loud voice coming from the tiniest person listening.

"I have had it up to here-" Histoire hovered her right hand over the top of her head. "-with all of your bickering over pointless things and your enormous egos! This planet could be very well in danger and **NONE** of you are taking this seriously at all! Believe me, I've heard about how ALL of you chose your personal belongings over your own citizens and I am thoroughly furious! Books, cosplay outfits, video games, gun collections, toys and gadgets. Not ONE of you is fit to call yourself a CPU. Neptune's incompetence I expect, I'd be stupid to think otherwise, but YOU, Noire, are perhaps the one CPU I should - no - WOULD expect to take this seriously but even you have failed to live up to my expectations!"

Silence fell once again as the CPUs started to reflect on their actions, well, most of them at any rate.

 _"Lame! Histy really is Pisty!"_ A quiet voice belonging to Ram was heard through the connection from Lowee.

"And who do you think is responsible for me being 'Pisty', hmm Ram? All of you!" Histoire pointed fingers at every screen and at Neptune and Nepgear.

On the Lowee end, Rom was whimpering, scared by Histoire's outburst while Ram was just rolling her eyes while Blanc was glaring at Ram.

At Lastation Noire was struggling to not argue with Histoire, especially since she knew the Oracle was right, plus she also felt like she was setting a bad example for Uni, who in turn had slumped to the floor and sighed heavily, feeling guilty about her actions and how she has shamed Noire and Lastation.

In Leanbox, well, Chika wasn't bothered at all.

 _'Geez, I think SOMEONE needs to play some of my darling's yaoi or naked butler games.'_

No-one seemed to notice the glazed look over Chika's eyes as she started fantasizing...

Finally, in Planeptune, Nepgear was feeling very ashamed of herself, as one would expect while Neptune...wasn't.

"Hey, come on Histy, what about Vert! Y'know, the one goddess that isn't actually here, unlike yours truly." Neptune giggled.

 _"I hate to say it, but Neptune does have a point there. Vert IS the only one who isn't here like she should be. The supposed 'mature' one is AWOL."_ Noire commented to Histoire.

"Yes, I know. Chika, I will have you send Vert over here when she returns and I will scold her personally!"

Silence.

"Chika? CHIKA!" Histoire shouted.

 _"OH! Yes? Sorry, I was...erm...busy for a bit. Yes. Busy."_ The Leanbox Oracle tried to cover herself (metaphorically speaking).

"Vert. Send her here when she returns. A good scolding she needs." Histoire said without hiding the frustration in her voice.

 _"But...how long will she be in Planeptune for?"_ To no-one's surprise, Chika was worried about being apart from Vert for longer than any time necessary (though 'necessary' in Chika's eyes rarely had anything in that list).

"About three days."

 _"Three DAYS?! How can you scold someone for three days?"_ Chika exclaimed.

"Oh, it is possible. Trust me, Chika. Histy can make _anything_ last three days." Neptune interjected.

Histoire cleared her throat and exhaled loudly.

"Well, with that out of the way, the meta references and fourth-wall breaking finished with, let us continue..."

* * *

IF had made good progress down south. Like a number of reports she had leafed through suggested, there number of monsters had been decreasing steadily the further south she had gone. There had only been a few low level trash mobs for her to slash her way through, nothing an experienced fighter like her couldn't handle. She had heard an odd rumbling sound in the sky for a few seconds, but the sound had quickly dissipated and she couldn't put a finger on what it was. It sounded vaguely like thunder, but there were no storm clouds anywhere in sight - there were very few clouds in the sky to begin with.

As IF moved forwards, her attention was caught by a burn hole in a nearby tree. Moving towards the tree, she saw a trail of burn marks in the ground leading up to the tree, two trails of burn marks running parallel, equidistant from each other and each set around five feet, give or take a few, apart. Something HAD happened here, but what? IF knelt down next to one of the burn marks and gingerly extended a hand towards the mark. She could feel residual heat coming off the mark.

 _'This is recent. I have no idea what temperature it started off at, but I'm guessing pretty high if the tree got burnt through. I haven't seen anything like this anywhere else, so why here? What makes this place so special?'_

IF frowned and looked at the tree.

 _'Maybe something the other side of it?'_

The Planeptune agent stood up, armed herself and carefully moved around the tree...

"Holy shit!"

IF was greeted by a male human corpse with a burn mark through the base of his neck, his eyes still filled with fear in the final expression stuck on his face. His death must have been instantaneous. Question flooded IF's mind as she looked away and steeled herself. She took a deep breath, reached over and closed the dead man's eyes. She started looking about his body to see if he was carrying anything.

 _'He found something. Why did he not-'_

A few beeps on one of her phones stopped her train of thought. IF located which phone had gone off and it showed she had received a text message - from an agent from Lastation. The agent lying here was wearing a Lastation uniform. IF grunted as she shook herself from her train of thought and focused on the message, which had been sent to herself and Noire.

("Lady Noire & IF, 4give my quick type. Big probs. Area of quake comes from unknown base. Portal there. Base big. Been here ages. Scared. Leader saw me from 400 yards away. Chasing after me. Big lag here. Trying to send pics.")

IF had a feeling of dread wash over her as she picked up the phone from the deceased agent...

* * *

"Seriously?! Is this some kind of joke?!" Noire yelled after she had read the message out to the council.

"Hey, Noire. P-please, calm down." Uni tentatively said to her enraged sister.

Noire eyed her and growled angrily.

 _"Yeah, chill out Lonely Heart. All that stressy is why you don't have any friends."_ Neptune teased Noire.

"Shut it Neptune! Grr! What the HELL is going on here?! Do we really have some unknown enemies right on our doorstep and we haven't seen them? AND they've been here for years?! Is this even true?"

 _"Yes, I understand your concerns, Noire. I myself am not certain what to make of this. Perhaps I should contact IF, since she received the message too."_ Histoire pondered.

 _"Well I think it must be true, I mean, come on! This whole scene would be pointless if it turned out to be a lie. What kind of a story would that be?"_ Neptune used her story-advancing plot skill.

Surprisingly nobody commented on her for saying that nor told her to stop breaking the fourth wall either.

 _"Well, don't forget Vert is already on her way there, we could make contact with her and ask her to scout out. Turn her rash action into an advantage for us."_ Blanc suggested.

 _"A portal of some kind...I wonder if it is an inter-dimensional portal. We seem to come across those fairly regularly. I wonder how big it is and how it is powered? If this is true, how have they been able to hide their presence from us for so long?"_ Nepgear started wondering out loud. _"Maybe spies? Some kind of mind control device?"_

 _"Hey, Gamindustri to Nepgear, are you there?"_ Neptune asked her sister. _"Hey, kiddo, you still with us?"_

Noire rested her right elbow on the desk and placed her hand on her forehead, shaking her head. Apparently Nepgear was lost in her own little world now.

"Okay, there are too many distractions going on. Can we focus on our next plan of action?" The frustration in Noire's voice was starting to reach a dangerous level.

 _"I must agree. If this new report is correct, then Vert may be in danger. As such, both Neptune and Noire, both of you shall depart immediately and chase after her. Blanc, since you are too far away to help with this, I will have a second job for you to do which I will give to you once we have finished here."_ Histoire ordered the CPUs. _"Chika, try and contact Vert and get her to either return to Planeptune or hold position until Neptune and Noire arrive."_

 _"Of course, I shall try and contact her immediately."_ Chika nodded and switched the Leanbox feed off.

"Fine, given how long it'll take Neptune to get ready, we'll meet up to the south of Virtua Forest. That should give you enough time to not keep me waiting." Noire taunted as she switched the Lastation feed off, denying Neptune the chance of retaliation.

"Noire, I wanna go with you! I can help you!" Uni stated, desperate to help her older sister.

"No, Uni." Noire sternly said.

Noire stood up from her desk and made her way over to the balcony outside her office. She looked over at the younger tsundere and saw Uni's eyes fall in disappointment and sighed.

"Look, Uni, I need you and Kei to pour over every agent report that we have had from that area over the past ten years. I know that far back is before you were born, so Kei can handle that older reports, but I cannot shake the feeling in my very soul that there are traitors in our midst. Every nation will have to have some for us to not know anything about them or this supposed base they have been hiding." Noire paused and a solemn look formed on her face. "Who knows how high they've been able to infiltrate to keep everything quiet for so long..."

Uni's eyes widened and she gasped.

"Y-you aren't suggesting that Kei..."

Noire raised a hand to silence Uni.

"In my heart of hearts, I don't believe Kei to be a spy, but I wouldn't be a very good CPU if I didn't keep that suspicion until I have concrete proof one way or another. I'm sure the other Oracles, with the exception of Histoire, will all be considered the same, even if not by the CPUs they reside with. I'm sure they will know that and will want to prove they aren't spies even if it is just to put our minds at ease. Besides, you spent a lot of time with Kei when I was captured for three years, I dare say you know her better than I do."

Uni nodded and smiled at her older sister.

"Yeah, I understand, sis. I want to help you the best I can."

"I know, Uni. Your time will come, I guarantee it."

With that, Noire activated HDD and took to the sky, eager to arrive before Neptune so she could get in some much desired taunts and insults again.

* * *

With the meeting between the goddesses over, General Brodrick and Major Mason were both left rather uncertain on what to make about what they had heard.

"General, I know from reading the bio of each goddess here that they are quite...quirky...but really? I just can't understand how they all **became** goddesses. I'm tempted to say they are actually more human than we are. And we **are** human!" Major Mason shook his head.

"I know what you mean, Major. I can't help but think these goddesses are actually quite pathetic and we would walk all over them if we launched a full scale invasion. Though, they do seem to be more capable when they are actually in their goddess forms, from everything I've read about them. No matter how they come across, we cannot let our guard down though. We know for certain that the Leanbox goddess is on her way here with the Planeptune and Lastation goddesses in tow."

"What would be the best plan of action, General?"

General Brodrick rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he turned to face the Major.

"Send a message to _Epsilon_ that Green Heart is imminent and that Purple Heart and Black Heart will be arriving soon. Lord Grey Heart will undoubtedly be eager to gauge the strength of our foes. Also, send a message to our Lowee agents and see if they can find out what exactly what job White Heart has been given to do."

"Yes, General." Major Mason saluted his superior and left.

General Brodrick called up the files on the three approaching goddesses and began attempting to find any weaknesses they may have to exploit. He was most curious about what White Heart was being tasked with, though.

* * *

IF wasn't quite sure if she was doing the right thing by continuing onwards towards the invaders base. Given what she had seen, these people were not to be taken lightly and killing the agent was a final attempt at keeping their presence hidden - one that had failed but set off numerous flags, and none of them were good. Still, IF had to know what happening, what the goddesses would be up against. With the message being sent to Noire also, IF suspected that the goddesses would arrive sooner rather than later.

One thing that still bugged her is exactly how the Lastation agent was killed. Yes, something had burned through him but there was no evidence of any other person having been there. The vegetation hadn't been heavily flattened or destroyed so that ruled out and vehicles.

 _'Perhaps it has something to do with that fading rumble I heard? Only remotely plausible thing to link the murder with.'_

The further south IF went, the more fear she felt rising within her. The more she started to think about what if she were to end up like that agent. She grabbed one of her phones and dialled Histoire. Well, she tried to anyway, but the call wouldn't go through. IF looked at the screen and saw there was barely one bar on the signal strength.

 _'Damn it all! I thought all these issues had been sorted out after ASIC had their asses handed to them and Gear took out the Deity of Sin!'_

An angry sigh exhaled from IF's mouth as she put her phone back on her belt. When she looked up, the sigh was replaced with a gasp as she clearly saw large amounts of white gases being blown into the sky; IF had arrived at the enemy's base. She was filled with anxiety and nervousness about what she was doing, but she knew she had to be here. There was another rumble in the sky, this time much louder and it was moving. IF looked up to where she could hear the noise and saw a fairly small mechanical object in the sky heading north, though "small" is only due to the distance between her and the object.

 _'I'll take a punt and they that my hunch is completely correct.'_

It was time for IF to do some recon of her own.

To Be Continued.


	4. Chapter 3

Chapter 3 First Contact

The goddess of Leanbox, CPU Green Heart, had been muttering under her breath for much of the flight from her Basilicom to where the earthquake had originated. Now she had calmed down a bit and was starting to think more rationally.

 _'What is it I actually plan to do when I get there? I can't exactly carve up the landscape and punish the planet for what has transpired. Such an action would not suit a lady like myself - more of a Blanc thing to do. Maybe I should call Chika and let her know I've calmed down.'_ Green Heart thought as she pressed her lips together and sighed.

"Oh, heavens! The meeting! I completely forgot about it!" The goddess yelled out loud as she called up her internal processor communicator.

When Green Heart tried to contact the Leanbox Basilicom, however, all she was getting was static on the screen. She tried a few times but to no avail.

"Fine, I'll call Planeptune then."

Results: exactly the same. It was also the same with Lastation and Lowee too. With a huff of annoyance, Green Heart closed down the communicator and resorted to using her phone. She pulled it out of...

Okay, on that note, where exactly WOULD Vert have her phone in her true form? You don't see any kind of bulge in their outfits where the phone would be do you? Like Nepgear said at the start of Action Unleashed, they wear skin suits when in their goddess forms. Where would any of them have their phones? Not like their goddess outfits have pockets in them. It's like where does Compa keep her syringe that she uses to fight monsters with? Would it be best to just leave it to the reader's imagination? Even if the, uh, specific area they keep their phones in happens to be down their tops. Probably (or in her shorts in Green Heart's case...Probably. Maybe).

"I'm certain you all will enjoy wondering where I pull my phone out from, won't you?" Green Heart giggled. "Maybe if there is another anime, I will show you exactly...where...I keep it. I may even let you get it for me too." With a seductive wink to finish THAT particular image.

No reason why the others can't break the fourth wall every now and then, right?

Anyway, Green Heart tried dialling Chika's number but...

"Service unavailable. Please try again later." A calm female voice came out of the speaker.

"Huh?" Green Heart was confused.

The goddess looked at the screen, specifically the signal strength, and saw just one bar.

"Well, either Planeptune has got awful phone service nowadays or something fishy is going on here. I'll try texting Chika instead."

Texting while flying wasn't something that Green Heart had done that often so remembering to keep an eye on where she was going was a tad annoying. Regardless, she successfully typed her message out, sent the text and replaced her phone from whence it came from. A few minutes later her phone buzzed.

"Oh, my!" Green Heart was relieved she was alone so nobody could hear that excited (and slightly shameless) response.

 _'Something is going on here. Great that my text got through, but it did take far longer than it should have. What though? I suppose it is possible that a transmission tower or two were damaged during the earthquake but we had no problems or latency issues during our video conference yesterday.'_

Green Heart kept wondering about these various things until she spotted something approaching her at high speed. And it was making quite the racket. And it launched a missile directly at her.

"What in the name of Uranus is that?!" Green Heart yelled at she summoned her spear and barely dodged the missile.

* * *

 _Flashback: Twenty-five minutes previous._

"Manta One, activate thermal imaging camera."

Grey Heart sat in the command seat of _Epsilon_ , remotely flying Manta 1 from the carrier. He hadn't had any luck tracking down the spy due to the vegetation at ground level.

 _'Perhaps the expeditionary forces did_ _ **too**_ _good a job in wiping out the resident monsters from around here.'_

With the imaging overlay now showing heat signatures, it would be easier to locate the spy, and it certainly didn't take long. The spy was keeping low to the ground to remain hidden, but unfortunately the trees cannot cover heat. Grey Heart lined up the Manta and unleashed a volley of laser bursts at the spy, one bolt directly hitting the spy.

 _'That will cover us for a while, maybe. The jammer should have prevented any calls from getting through so the goddesses will not know what to expect then they arrive.'_

There was a beep from the carrier A.I.

MESSAGE FROM GENERAL BRODRICK RECEIVED. DISPLAY?

"Display the message and set Manta One to autopilot for return to re-fuel and re-arm." Grey Heart ordered the ship A.I.

ORDERS ACKNOWLEDGED. DISPLAYING MESSAGE. MANTA 1 - RETURN TO HANGAR.

General Brodrick had sent a summary of the meeting between the goddesses. The goddess Green Heart was not present at the meeting and was apparently on her way over here. The General had highlighted constant bickering between the goddesses and an apparent lack of harmony between them. There was also a note that the goddess of Lastation, Black Heart, had received a message from the spy.

 _'So they know we are here now, then. This doesn't help, but perhaps the lack of knowledge that Green Heart has of us can be used to our advantage.'_

" _Epsilon._ Prep Manta Two for launch. Armament to consist of three missiles on the wings and laser cannon."

ACKNOWLEDGED. MANTA 2, ARMAMENT SET. LAUNCHING IN 60 SECONDS.

* * *

 _Outside south entrance to Virtua Forest, present time._

"What kept you? I've been here for fifteen minutes." Black Heart asked as Purple Heart landed in front of her.

"I apologise, Noire, but I've had a hard time trying to contact Iffy. Plus I also had to spend a while convincing Nepgear to stay behind with Histy."

"Excuses, excuses. You always have them, don't you?"

"Let us get going." Purple Heart ignored the taunt from Black Heart as the two goddesses took to the sky.

"Have you been able to contact Vert?" Purple Heart asked.

"No. I kept getting 'Service unavailable' messages every time I called. I called Uni and asked her to try, but she had no luck either. Something isn't right with this. Do you think the enemy has some kind of jammer set up?" Black Heart asked.

"I suppose it is possible. If Iffy is down this way too, that would explain why I haven't been able to contact her. She isn't in Planeptune, that much is for sure."

The two goddesses flew in silence for a while.

"Say, Noire, my human self had a question for you."

"What is it?" Black Heart sighed.

"If I remember correctly...it was 'whose voice do you want the readers to hear when you speak?'. I'm certain that was it." Purple Heart ran an index finger along her chin.

"Huh? What do you mean 'whose voice'? Mine, of course. I don't want them to imagine Plutia's - or worse, Iris Heart's voice - when I speak."

"Come on, Noire. Your voice changed in the last game so who do you want the readers to hear when you speak? Your old voice or your new one?"

"W-well, the best one! That goes without saying of course. But I-I think it should be down to the individual reader on who they want to hear when I speak. N-not like I want them to hear a specific voice or a-anything." Black Heart is getting close to going into Tsun mode.

"Uh-huh. Which voice do you prefer, exactly?" Purple Heart was genuinely interested in finding out.

"You know, why don't you bug Vert with this question? After all, her voice changed too and you never bothered to ask her about this!" Black Heart is now desperately trying to change the subject off of her. "Don't forget that IF's voice changed for the anime too!"

We'll leave that there. For the record, I, the author, hear Erin Fitzgerald's Noire and Black Heart voices when she speaks. Don't get me wrong, I think Erica Mendez did a great job in Cyberdimension Neptunia, but I prefer Erin's voice.

* * *

IF had spent a while observing the enemy. She had made many notes on her observations, but it was the portal that took great interest. She could see the light bending in the centre of the structure, swirling back and forth. No-one took any notice of it so IF assumed it was not active at the moment. One thing she did find interesting was the tracks coming from the portal that lead to a large yard of multiple tracks, some of which were occupied. IF saw long rakes of loaded coal and iron ore hoppers amongst a variety of different coloured containers.

She focused on the naval vessel just off shore. It looked quite dormant but she had seen a flying object land on the centre of the deck and be lowered within the naval vessel. There had to be people on board, but she couldn't see anyone on the outside of the vessel.

The power plant was primitive. It released lots of hot gases into the sky constantly as it produced power. It sort of reminded her of Lastation's factories as Noire's nation strived for technological superiority over Planeptune in true Noire fashion.

IF's thoughts were interrupted by an odd sound coming from the portal. When she turned to look at it, the portal was open and she could just about see _something_ on the other side. A few people made their way over to the portal as a loud rumbling sound came through the portal. This sound was followed by the appearance of two locomotives coming through, pulling a variety of different wagons. The portal closed after the final wagon had passed through.

Directly behind the second locomotive were four red coloured containers on long flatbed trucks, ten smaller flatbed trucks with a tank chained onto each one, two white containers and three blue containers. IF observed the shunting manoeuvre that took place and the wagons were split so the red containers and the flatbeds went with the second locomotive while the first locomotive took the rest. The red containers and tanks were taken somewhere further down the line (IF hadn't got that far yet), while the others went to another siding on an artificially heightened embankment to keep it well above sea level.

 _'I'll take a stab that Gamindustri isn't the only place they are.'_ IF thought as she decided to try and get a better look at what the goddesses would be dealing with, starting with those blue containers.

* * *

Green Heart had quickly surmised that she was fighting a losing battle. While she had successfully dodged the missile, repeatedly so until it exploded upon reaching the end of the fuel life, the fast adversary she was up against fired off two more. Plus while she was dodging missiles, she had to deal with laser cannon burst too. And those hurt! She'd been hit with a few of them.

"Oh for heaven's sake! This is the first fight and I'm immediately in a 'guaranteed loss' situation?! What kind of game hacking skill is this? How can I beat something so fast with ranged weapons with a spear! If only I had Nepgear or Uni with me." Green Heart lamented her position.

She ducked as one of the missiles flew right where her head used to be, followed by rolling to her left to avoid the other one. From behind she heard the sound of the lasers firing and despite trying to fly up, she was caught by another blast.

"Ouch! Those things really hurt! At this rate my perfect skin will suffer burns."

Green Heart tried to avoid taking more pain by diving low to the ground and getting some cover from the trees. One missile slammed straight into a tree and exploded, so there was an instant result for the goddess of Leanbox.

 _'I need to find a way to get some hits on that thing.'_ Green Heart thought, referring to the Manta.

For Green Heart, her attempts to think of a plan failed to come to fruition as the final missile exploded near her, the force of the explosion unbalanced her and she caught the edge of a tree, taking a huge chunk out of it and sending her off in at an angle, rolling uncontrollably. Within seconds she was hit from behind by the Manta and was sent tumbling to the ground where she smashed through another tree head first, knocking her unconscious. Her HDD form failed as she lay prone on the ground.

In the carrier, Grey Heart laughed.

" _Epsilon_ , return Manta Two to the hangar." He ordered as he got out of his seat and made his way to the exit. "Send a message to General Brodrick that I will be returning shortly with a goddess as a prisoner."

He didn't need to see the acknowledgement from the A.I. as he wanted to recover the fallen goddess as soon as possible.

 _'Humiliating one of Gamindustri's precious goddesses, showing her people that she is weak and cannot protect her people should win me some followers. I could use the faith of people here for my sharicite.'_

Once on the flight deck, he took off and flew over to the goddess of Leanbox as fast as possible.

* * *

Blanc had flown to Planeptune to meet with Histoire. The plan that Blanc had been given was to travel to Plutia's Ultradimension to meet up with the other Planeptune goddess and secure the release of Uzume Tennouboshi from a request Plutia made a week ago (for those who don't know, for each day that passes in Megadimension, one year passes in Ultradimension, allegedly. I'm not certain how that actually works, but meh). Ultradimension had been plagued with severely increasing monster problems and the other CPUs there were tiring from the extreme work they were doing. With no CPU Candidates out there to aid in lowering the workload of the CPUs, Plutia was forced to ask mini-Histoire to contact Megadimension for help. Histoire had sent Uzume and Gold Third to help out Plutia at their own request (though some of their motives for going may have been questionable. I'm looking at you K-Sha). Now, Histoire wanted Uzume back to aid Gamindustri's CPUs against this potential new threat.

Dimensional travelling wasn't a problem for Blanc, but dropping out of the sky into a swarm of Crystal Golems was a problem. Blanc roughly counted at least sixty of the things and she was at a disadvantage as she couldn't activate her goddess form since she hadn't been given a CPU Memory. This meant she was actually just a human here and would age as so.

"You damn bastards! I'll kill you all!" Blanc raged, wasting no time in attacking the monsters while they were in a state of confusion.

Within a few seconds, Blanc had slain a small number of them, but now they were ready to strike back. Despite taking blows, Blanc kept swinging her hammer like a mad woman (or just a **really** pissed off version of herself), Crystal Golems fell at all angles but more kept coming. If she could use her HDD form, the battle would already be over with an axe-wielding psychotic goddess standing victorious with not a scratch upon her body.

"Damn it all. This is load of bullshit! Why do I get the crappy guaranteed loss for my first battle?!"

Blanc continued to shout obscenities until an odd shaped whip which doubled as a sword sliced through a number of Crystal Golems.

"Well, well. Looks like _someone_ needs to learn a few manners when they speak! It really annoys me when people keep swearing with complete disregard for anyone else around them!"

Blanc felt the mother of all shivers run down her spine. She literally froze at hearing the sadistic voice.

"Your punishment will come soon enough! First, these pests must pay for ruining the day I had planned!"

Blanc had indeed come across Plutia. Unfortunately for Blanc, Plutia was in her Sadie mode. Alas, poor Blanc, we knew ye well. Enjoy Sadie's torture.

* * *

"There. Allll good as new. Sooooorrrryyy, I got a little carried away back there, Blanny." Plutia apologised as she finished bandaging Blanc.

The two goddesses were sitting on a couch in Plutia's room as she finished up attending to the Lowee goddess she had inflicted pain upon in her HDD form.

"Ow."

"Soooo. What can I do for you? Why did you come here alllll the way from your home?" Plutia asked, tilting her head to one side.

"Histoire needs Uzume back. Hyperdimension has a new threat there and Histoire needs Uzume to return home to aid us." Blanc explained as she gingerly rubbed her left shoulder.

"I dunno. We've still got a lot of monster problems here, as you saw earlier. Uzume is a biiiiig help."

"You still have Gold Third's help. Can't they cover for Uzume?"

"I suppose so." Plutia shrugged her shoulders. "What is the new problem Neppy and the rest of you girls are facing?"

Blanc paused for a few moments, thinking about her answer.

"Well, the truth is that we don't actually have any concrete evidence. Yesterday morning an earthquake struck Gamindustri, but Histoire stated that our planet is tectonically stable and earthquakes do not happen. As we were discussing our plans today, Noire got a message from one of her agents stating that there is a base where the earthquake originated from, a base that has been there for years given the apparent size of it but has never been reported about before. That report is the only thing we have to go one right now until Vert returns from her scouting of the area. I, personally, am starting to believe we have a much bigger problem on our hands than we all realise. If that report is true, then how well entrenched into all our security and special ops teams have they got to keep their location a secret for so long? How much of our own forces can we actually trust?"

Blanc took a deep breath as Plutia tried to let the information sink in.

"Soooooo...why do you need Uzume back again?" Plutia asked as she scratched her cheek, rather confused.

Blanc sighed.

"We need her because the sooner we can sort this out, the better for everyone. Uzume's Sharing Field ability will undoubtedly be a great boon to sorting this out quickly. We could be facing a massive army, for all we know. Ideally, we'd like Gold Third back too, but none of us want to abandon you without aid which is why Histoire specifically wants Uzume back."

"Oooohh. Well, I suppose I can let you have her back if you promise to send Neppy and Neppy Junior here to help us out later. I'd loooooovvveeee to see them again." Plutia gushed at the thought of spending time with the Nep sisters again.

"Okay, I'm sure Neptune and Nepgear would be happy to help you."

"Okay! I'll get Histy to call Uzume and tell her the news." Plutia said as she jumped up and rushed off.

* * *

Grey Heart landed next to the still unconscious Leanbox CPU. He certainly wouldn't deny the beauty Vert possessed, but after fighting wars against numerous goddesses over the thousands of years he had been alive, he knew that the beauty of a goddess was one of their most dangerous weapons. The ability to simply sway the minds of simple-minded men with the bat of an eyelash or the subtle lean forward to allow them a 'better view'...things a god could not compete with. A rueful look formed on his face as he became lost in his thoughts. Thoughts of goddesses he had fought against, and had slain. The gods that had fallen to the devious tactics of goddesses...and then, there was HER. Crimson Heart. The one goddess who had been his adversary for far too many years to remember. Both of them had come close to finishing each other off many times...

He shook his head, bringing himself out of his stupor.

"Come on, man! Pull yourself together!" Grey Heart berated himself for getting so distracted.

He knelt down and picked Vert up, carrying her bridal style. The irony of this situation was not lost on the god; it made sense in his mind to eliminate the goddess before she could become a threat, but his vast network of spies had spent years dissuading him from just eliminating these goddesses as they believed the goddesses would be more receptive to co-existing due to the records of their own war and how Neptune had managed to end it peacefully. Besides, finishing her off here before humiliating her in front of her nation's people wouldn't win him as many followers.

He merely sighed and shook his head, his eyes drawn to the blonde's figure. There was no way he could deny the fact that this goddess had a stunning human form. He'd seen many goddesses in his lifetime, but he would have to rank Vert in the top thee at least in terms of beauty...

"Again, get a grip! This is a goddess here! You know how destructive they are, don't get distracted!" Grey Heart berated himself.

As he was about to leave, there was the distinct sound of trouble coming from behind him. It seemed as though the trouble had quickly become double trouble too...being distracted, of course, would lead to something like this happening.

"Unhand that goddess immediately! The turn round with your hands in the air!" Black Heart boomed as she summoned her sword.

"Careful, Noire. I feel great power in this one." Purple Heart warned as she also summoned her weapon.

Both goddesses pointed their weapons at their foe. Purple Heart was cautious while Black Heart was all too eager to pounce into a fight.

The distinctive male laugh filled their ears as Vert was, rather unceremoniously, dumped on the ground. The man turned to face the two friends and rivals. He eyed them both up and down.

"Wha? A...male goddess?" Black Heart was shocked and confused.

"Goddess? HA! Do I _really_ look like a goddess to you? No, young pups, I am a GOD!"

"God? Since when have there been gods among us?" Purple Heart asked, still pointing her weapon at the god.

"Gods existed before goddesses. WE oversaw the needs of humanity long before your kind came along. But enough chit-chat. Show me what you have, goddesses, if you want to save your kin." He gestured at the knocked out Vert.

"What did you do to her?" Black Heart demanded as she stepped closer.

"What does it look like? I knocked her unconscious. You goddesses are far less troublesome when you cannot act." Grey Heart focused on Black Heart's weapon. "You think that dinky little sword will stop me?"

"Dinky?! I'll have you know I can slice anything up with this! It'll be just fine in taking you down a few notches!" Black Heart charged, enraged at being insulted. "Let's see you deal with my Volcano Dive!"

Black Heart leapt into the air, her sword igniting in flames as she brought it down on the god.

"Gah!" Black Heart fell to the ground, landing on her back and dropping her sword. "What...happened?"

Steam vented out from Grey Heart's laser rifle. The god summoned the weapon and fired, hitting Black Heart at the base of her neck. If it wasn't due to being a goddess and having access to share energy, Black Heart would have be killed in an instant.

"Noire!" Purple Heart cried out as she closed the gap between Black Heart and Grey Heart.

The god turned to face Purple Heart and fired off another blast. The Planeptune goddess was expecting the shot and dived forwards to avoid it. She rolled onto her back to avoid a second blast and used her blade to deflect a third blast, a hissing sound ringing in her ears as the laser bolt burnt the ground where it landed, not to mention leaving a burn mark on her weapon. She quickly flew up into the sky and evaded more laser blasts.

"This is totally unfair! If you have to use that rifle, you should be using it later in the story when we look like we are going to beat you! Not straight away, that is a complete hack of the rules!" Purple Heart moaned.

"No, it is logic! Why not use what I have available to defeat you straight away? Why sell myself short and try to just be a little better when I can dominate you from the start?" Grey Heart countered.

Seriously though, between game logic and actual logic, you'd go all out from the start to beat your opponent.

Black Heart had recovered enough to fight on. She could feel the burn from where the laser bolt hit her and gently rubbed the area.

 _'That had better not leave a mark on my perfect skin or someone is gonna wish they'd never come here!'_ Black Heart fumed as she picked up her sword.

The Lastation CPU could see Purple Heart evading and unable to get close enough to engage in melee combat; the lack of any ranged weapons certainly had both goddesses at a disadvantage.

 _'Maybe I should have brought Uni along...'_

At the moment it seemed that the so-called 'god' was distracted by his desire to pump Purple Heart full of laser bolts, given the continuous sound of the laser rifle discharging. Black Heart dashed towards her foe once again and attacked.

"Forgot about someone, hmm? How about a Drop Crush!"

"Not bad." Grey Heart grunted as he took the full force of the attack.

"Would you like me to show you my Tornado Sword skill too?" Black Heart ignited her sword in flames again.

"I think I'll take this one, Noire. Critical Edge!" Purple Heart swooped in, taking advantage of not being fired upon.

The god took another blow and staggered back.

"C'mon! Keep hitting him, Neptune! We can take him down right here and find out who he really is." Black Heart grinned as both goddesses began to land blow after blow.

Grey Heart tried to block but using his laser rifle was pointless at this stage. He couldn't take these blows forever, he had to regain control of the battle.

"Damn, if you goddesses want to play rough, then allow me to show you how."

The god dismissed his rifle and summoned his sword instead. Both goddesses quickened their attacks, but with a single slash of his sword, Grey Heart stopped the advances of both Black Heart and Purple Heart, all three weapons locked together.

"THIS is a sword, goddess of Lastation."

Grey Heart's own sword was roughly one third bigger then Black Heart's, and also had a longer reach on it.

"Size...isn't everything you know! It's a question of...TECHNIQUE!" Black Heart roared as she put all her might into breaking the deadlock.

The weapons broke (figuratively) from the deadlock and Black Heart tried to attack again, but every swing was parried easily and every attack from Purple Heart was dodged.

"He is surprisingly agile." Purple Heart commented as she started to grow frustrated at not being able to land any more hits.

"Less talk, more fight!" Black Heart snapped.

Black Heart got in close and tried to slash the god, but he anticipated the move and parried, taking his left hand off from gripping the sword to land a punch right into Black Heart's solar plexus.

Black Heart coughed and clutched at where she had been punched. Grey Heart swung round and parried another attack from Purple Heart, then reached out and grabbed her, but it turned out it was by grabbing onto her suit's cleavage, and then threw her into Black Heart, with both goddesses butting heads and collapsing to the ground groaning in agony.

"You youngsters are so confident in yourselves, but you are so arrogant and that is your downfall." Grey Heart said as he brought his sword down and sliced off Purple Heart's shoulder processor units.

"Hnnggh!" Purple Heart grunted in pain as each processor unit was sliced off.

Grey Heart kicked Purple Heart off of Black Heart and proceeded to cut and break off her remaining processor units until they had all gone. The effect of this was basically an HDD crash and Purple Heart was forced back into her human form.

"What the heck?" Neptune asked as she wondered what had just happened. "Hey! You groped me! That was a full on boob grab if I ever felt one! Randy, old man perv!"

The god wore a 'What the heck?' look on his face. It most certainly wasn't what he had intended, just unfortunate how it turned out.

Black Heart sat up and held her hand to her forehead. She looked over at Neptune and then to the god.

 _'Oh, shit. We've got to get out of here. I'm sorry, Vert. We'll save you next time. I promise. I don't want to do this, but I have to.'_

She knew that if she didn't act fast, it would be her turn next and if she didn't escape, she doubted Blanc would be able to rescue the three of them by herself, or even with the help of their sisters. Black Heart pushed aside the pain she was feeling and jumped to her feet, took off towards Neptune and grabbed her arm, pulling her off the ground.

"H-hey! Whoa! Stop it Noire! We can't just leave Vert behind!" Neptune complained.

"I don't want to, but we have to! I doubt you could even transform again right now, and if I get forced out of my HDD form, we are as good as captured! Blanc wouldn't last one minute against him by herself! We have a better chance of staging a rescue with more of us!" Black Heart countered.

"Curse your sensible argument! Veeerrrrrrrttttttttttt!" Neptune wailed as the two goddesses escaped.

Grey Heart wanted to chase after them but the still unconscious goddess prisoner he had would make the more logical sense.

 _'What good will it be if I fail to catch those two and the Leanbox goddess regains consciousness while I'm away and escapes? I will stick with one prisoner to interrogate than risk having none.'_

Once again, he walked over to Vert, picked her up and launched into the air in the direction of his base.

* * *

 _Grey Heart's base, that evening. Detainment building. Cell 14._

"Ugh...Goodness, what...what have I been drinking?" Vert questioned out loud as she regained consciousness.

Vert's head hurt like hell and she wanted to gently rub it, but she found that difficult. The sound of metal clinking as she tried to move her hands made her aware that something was wrong. As she slowly raised her head, she could see her hands were bound in strange metallic cuffs. There was a mysterious blue hue to them.

"Where am I?"

Vert was able to sit up and swing her legs onto the floor. She was on a rather simplistic bed - a couple of plain pillows, mattress and a couple of sheets. She noticed the large metal bars blocking the only way out of the room.

"Oh, a prisoner am I?"

There was a toilet in the cell, with a courtesy wall and a sink the other side of the wall.

 _'Well, that is a bit basic, isn't it? Still, to have access to facilities such as these while incarcerated shows a bit of courtesy for one's captives.'_

"Well, I must thank my captors of their generous hospitality in providing me a bed while I slept, but now it is time for me to leave. They think this is enough to hold a goddess? I'll show them exactly who they are dealing with."

Vert activated HDD...only for nothing to happen.

"What sorcery is this? No HDD? No matter, I will use my spear."

Vert tried to summon her spear from her inventory, but once again, nothing happened.

"That game cheat is this? Someone is seriously hacking the coding here with this!"

Vert walked over to the bars that served as the door into her cell and leant against them.

"Hello? Excuse me, is there anyone there?" Vert shouted, hoping at least a guard was within earshot of her.

"Hey, is that you Miss Busty?" A familiar voice called from the cell opposite Vert.

"Hmm? Neptune?! Is that you?" Vert asked, shocked.

Indeed, it was Neptune. But not the goddess Neptune. The human adult Neptune from Ultradimension came into view of Vert.

"The big Neptune...what are you doing here?" Vert asked.

"Long story, but since we have plenty of time on our hands, why don't I tell it to ya?"

To Be Continued...

Author's Note: Just something I thought of while writing this chapter. We know that there is a Neptune, Blanc, Vert, Noire, Arfoire, Histoire, IF and Compa in Hyperdimension as well as Ultradimension. So does that mean there is a Plutia and Peashy in Hyperdimension? If so, where are they?


	5. Chapter 4

Chapter 4: The Prisoners

Vert was shocked to see the other Neptune, not to mention being locked up in a cell too. Vert started to wonder just what was going on here and how did Neptune wind up here as well.

"Please, tell me what you know. Start off with now - where exactly are we?" Vert asked.

"Hmm...not sure really. I've been here quite a long time but I kinda have lost track of time, you know? No clock or calendar really makes it hard to follow time. I've asked for something to help me out with that but the guards keep refusing, I mean, kinda rude really. Only indication of time I get really is the three meals a day they bring me and generally how much sunlight I can see down the hall." Neptune explained.

None of that really helped Vert out that much, but perhaps asking different questions might get better results.

"Do you know who these people are?"

Neptune scratched the back of her head and frowned, thinking hard.

"Erm...not really. They aren't exactly that talkative, but they did say that they think I'm cute." Neptune giggled. "Well, I do remember one of the guards saying something about their leader will want to see me. By the way, he did come and see me. Asked me questions and stuff. You know, they aren't from here. They're from some other planet far away. Something different about the hotshot in charge, too. Can't put my finger on it though."

"Wait, wait. These people who have us here...they aren't from here? As in...from Gamindustri? Like Ultradimension?" Vert was shocked.

"Sorta, I guess." Neptune shrugged her shoulders.

"Okay, okay. So, how did you end up here, then?"

"Well..."

* * *

 _Flashback: 127 days ago._

A mock battle was taking place in the grounds of Grey Heart's base on Gamindustri. The soldiers were split into two teams with one attacking and one defending. General Brodrick was leading the defenders while Major Mason was leading the attackers. The defenders were deliberately outnumbered as the General wanted to test his tactical calls in, at least, attempting to hold off the enemy for as long as possible. The rules were simple: the battle would be over if either side loses all troops, General Brodrick is killed, Major Mason is killed, the attackers enter the command bunker or if the defenders hold out for thirty minutes.

Note: No-one will actually die in this battle. "Killing" an opponent is merely by hitting a target on a person with a paintball gun. If the defenders hold out, the timer signifies the arrival of Lord Grey Heart and _Epsilon_ to turn the tide of battle in favour of the defenders.

"Major, is everything set on your end?" The General asked through his communicator.

 _"Yes, General. We are all ready to begin the exercise."_

"Excellent. The battle shall begin at fourteen hundred hours exact."

 _"Yes, sir. Mason, out."_

Both officers ran through their respective plans with their troops and waited for the designated start time. When the time came, the mock battle began. The attackers charged forwards, firing at any defender they saw, while the defenders were grouped small and sprayed paintballs everywhere upon the attackers, trying to take down as many as they could before being 'killed'.

The attack was a feint from the Major, he led a smaller group of ten soldiers to bypass the majority of the defences while they were busy with the main group. His preferred way of winning was to enter the command bunker, any other way would be a bonus. General Brodrick was a relatively meticulous man and he had thought of a number of ways in which the Major would try to win, the way he was currently trying was one of them. Several guards had been placed in the cover of trees or hiding inside or near various things around the base to ambush any infiltrators.

On the main field of battle, a loud scream was getting nearer and nearer...

"Heeeeeeyyyy! Everyoooooonnnnneeeee! Moooooovvveee!"

One of the attackers stopped and furrowed his brow.

"Hey, do any of you hear that?" He asked, just before being hit with a number of paintballs.

"Great going, man. You're out!" Another attacker complained.

"Nah, seriously. Does no-one hear that?" He asked again.

"I said mooovvveeee! Seriously! GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

More and more troops stopped fighting as they heard the voice coming from above.

"What the heck is that?" One of the defenders asked as all the soldiers looked up at where the voice was coming from.

"I...think it's a girl?" A third attacker replied, not sure exactly what she was seeing.

The falling person kept yelling for people to move, but the soldiers were a bit too dumbstruck to do anything until it was too late. Neptune landed on six of them, knocking them all to the ground.

"Ow! That one hurt. Are all of you okay?" She asked as she picked herself up.

"Shit! It's a goddess! Alert the General and Major! Everyone, take aim!" One of the junior officers commanded, not realising that this wasn't the Neptune he thought it was.

"Hey, whoa there! Language, buddy. I'm not gonna hurt anyone, and I'm not a goddess."

"Don't move! Hands up above your head!"

"If I'm not allowed to move, how can I put my hands in the air?" Neptune smirked.

However, the fact that she had around forty (paintball) guns, not that she realised that's what they were, trained on her made her think that she should just do what they say.

"Crostie, any way out of this?" Neptune whispered as she held her hands up high.

"The hell if I know. You're the genius who can't dimension hop properly, despite how many times you do it. You figure something out for once." Croire argued from inside the Nep-Note.

"Turn around!"

Neptune did a 180 and waited. She couldn't do anything to escape until she could put her arms down.

"Hey, my arms are getting tired. Can I put them down now?" Neptune asked hopefully.

"No. Don't give me any crap like that. Now walk forwards. Slowly. If you try to run, we'll shoot you." The officer ordered.

Neptune let out a huff and did as she was told, even though she really didn't want to. It was only a matter of seconds before both Brodrick and Mason arrived.

"What is this strange report, Sergeant? Some girl falls out of the sky and she is the goddess of Planeptune?" Brodrick demanded.

"Yes, sir. Here." He pointed to Neptune.

Both Mason and Brodrick looked at Neptune, who in turn looked at them. Both senior officers looked at each other before sighing.

"This isn't the goddess of Planeptune. I think." Mason said, unsure.

"She looks too...grown up. Who are you?" Brodrick asked as he approached Neptune.

"Me, no-one really. Just messed up my landing, that's all. Shoulda been further down the coast but I find dimensional hopping a wee bit tricky sometimes." Neptune explained.

Brodrick frowned. "Are you the goddess of Planeptune?" He asked.

"No. I'm just a cute girl who likes collecting bug specimens from all over the galaxy."

"Name."

"Ohhh. I'm Neptune. It's nice to meet you. Hey, do you think I could put my arms down now? They're kinda sore now."

"So...you ARE Neptune, but you aren't the goddess of Planeptune?" Mason asked as he stood next to Brodrick.

"Nope. Not a goddess, but I do know the Planeptune goddess. I call her 'Tiny Me' since she is basically a younger me from here whereas I'm not."

Both officers were sceptical.

"Private..." Brodrick said to one of the female soldiers. "Frisk her for anything she has. Sergeant, get us a pair of those heavy duty handcuffs."

"Sir!" The Sergeant ran off to a military warehouse to obtain what was asked for.

The female soldier approached Neptune and began frisking her.

"Woah! Careful where your hands go, sister. I don't swing that way!" Neptune exclaimed while being frisked in one certain area.

Neptune ended up breaking down into fits of laughter when her hips, stomach and back were done and reminded everyone of her sexual preference when the **other** area was frisked. In all, her Nep-Note was taken from her pocket, her gun, and one hundred credits.

"Hey! I was gonna buy snacks with that!" Neptune moaned as the money and Nep-Note were handed over to Major Mason. The gun was handed to General Brodrick.

"Hmm." Brodrick inspected the gun. "Kinetic based damage - standard. Fully loaded. My, why DO you have a gun with you?"

"A girl's gotta protect herself. Monsters, crazy Goth grandmas, insane girls wanting to destroy the universe and what-not."

Both senior officers looked at each other, the expressions on their faces suggesting that they doubted the sanity of Neptune. Understandable really, considering they haven't faced anything like Neptune had suggested - except the monsters.

"Now you may put your arms down, but stand still." Brodrick ordered Neptune.

She sighed in relief as she let her arms fall to her sides. The Sergeant returned with the handcuffs and handed them to Mason. The Major clicked them onto Neptune's wrists, much to her dismay, and aired numerous complaints as she was forcibly led to the prison. She was placed in a cell and locked in. All her complaining had yielded no positive results at all.

"You will be staying here for the foreseeable future. If you cause any trouble, you will lose what privileges you are afforded here. Make yourself comfortable." Mason said as he turned to leave.

"Wait. What about my Nep-Note? Can't I have it back?"

"Your possessions are confiscated. You will receive them back if you are released. Oh, and those handcuffs are interwoven with pure share energy designed seal access to your inventory, so anything you had not physically on your person, you will not be able to access."

 _'Well, there goes cutting my way out of here with my swords.'_ Neptune complained in her mind. Something she was told then hit her.

"Wait! What do you mean by 'if' I'm released? What have I been arrested for anyway?" Neptune cried out in frustration.

"You aren't under arrest, but you are imprisoned until we can be certain you are not the goddess of Planeptune."

With that, Major Mason walked off and left Neptune alone.

* * *

 _Present time._

"So, there you have it. Been here ever since and I still haven't got my credits back, nor my Nep-Note." Neptune summed up for Vert. "My trusty pistol is still in the possession of that General, I think."

"They still think you are our Neptune?"

"Heck, no. Two days later they told me that they believed I wasn't Tiny Me. But they can't let me go, something to do with no-one on this planet knowing they are here and they can't afford to let anyone find out. I bet Crostie tried to bribe them to let her out, which is probably how they know I'm not Tiny Me." Neptune theorised.

"Didn't you say that you met their leader a while ago?"

"Yeah. You wanna know more about him?"

"Yes, if you'd be so kind."

"Well..." Neptune started.

* * *

 _Flashback: 83 days ago._

Neptune had figured she'd been locked up for around six weeks by now. She was starting to lose count of the days. She was bored out of her mind and she really wanted to play a game, even a simple pack of cards would be welcome now. She had got bored of singing to herself, training was no real time killer and she was restricted in what she could do due to the size of the cell, and she didn't want to sleep. Occasionally a guard would come by and Neptune would desperately try to talk his ear off to alleviate boredom. Every once in a while the guard would change so a least she could get someone new to try and talk to.

Right now she was lying on her bed trying to occupy her mind with thoughts of new pudding types she could come up with. She'd already thought of 257 new varieties, but the continuation of her unwarranted captivity led her to aim for 1000 new varieties as a starting point.

 _'I'll probably need to think up of over one million before I can get out of here...'_

Her train of thought was interrupted by the sound of two pairs of feet walking down the hall. Neptune jumped off her bed and slammed into the metal bars.

"Hey! Hey! Visitors! Over here! I'm borrrrreeedddd!" She yelled, sticking her hand through the bars and waving frantically.

"The, uh, prisoner...my Lord." The guard introduced Neptune to the other man.

"So, she looks like the goddess of Planeptune, yet she isn't. Alternate dimension, the report said, yes?" The other man asked the guard.

"Yes, sir! Our understanding is that she is a human. Think what the goddess of Planeptune would look like if she wasn't a goddess." The guard handed the other man the key to Neptune's cell.

"Hey! Don't ignore me! I'm Neptune and boy am I bored! But some company would be nice and by the looks of it your gonna give me some! Come in, please! I've been extra good these past two weeks or so, so can I have a game to play with when I'm all alone again?" Neptune rambled, pouting at the end.

"Is she alright? She seems a little...mentally frazzled." The other man whispered to the guard.

"Well, we haven't had any trouble with her since she tried to escape a month ago. Taking away some privileges for a week or so set her straight."

At the mention of her escape, Neptune's face went blank as she remembered her punishment. Her failed escape attempt (due to trying to find her Nep-Note and ending up walking right into the Command Bunker when all the officers were there) had landed her in a special solitude cell. It was horrible, designed to make one long for the amenities they were afforded in regular captivity. It was a tiny cell no more than five feet in length and four feet wide with no bed, no sink, the door was a made fully out of reinforced metal with only two tiny slats in it (one for a person to look into the cell near the top and the other was to push a liquid meal through at the bottom). There was no toilet. Just a bucket. The bucket never got emptied while the cell was in use. Neptune spent six days and nights in there. I'll leave the rest of the 'pleasantries' to your own imagination.

When she came out of her stupor, she was sitting on her bed.

"Huh? How did I get here?" She asked.

The man had guided Neptune to her bed and sat her down while she was going through the images stuck in her brain. Neptune saw the other man standing off to the side, near the cell door. Given that he was pulling the key out of the lock, he obviously had just locked the cell from the inside. He turned and approached her which allowed her the chance to study his features. Quite tall, fairly well built with definite muscles all over his body. He looked around late thirties if she would hazard a guess. His eyes, though, looked like they had been through much. His whole body language spoke unspoken words of someone who had witnessed a number of hardships and had fought many battles.

"Who are you?" Neptune asked.

"Someone you need not concern yourself with, providing you ARE a human and not a goddess." He replied.

"Why did that guard call you 'My Lord'? You own some land or something? Heir to a throne?" Neptune asked. "What's wrong with goddesses, anyways?"

There was no response. The man seemed to zone out for a while, his eyes narrowing with the look of hatred across his face.

 _'Guess that is one sore topic.'_ Neptune thought as she sighed and crossed her arms.

After a few minutes of silence, Neptune was bored again.

"Hey, you there? You gonna stop spacing out now, right?" Neptune waved her hand frantically, trying to get the man's attention.

"Goddesses destroy everything. Warmongers, the lot of them." The man muttered.

"Huh? You been living in a cave or something? When have goddesses been warmongers, buddy?"

"Years...decades...centuries. Millennia. Goddesses bring chaos wherever they go and must be destroyed for the good of humanity."

"Whoa! If this is gonna become a therapy session, I'm gonna start charging you for my services. You've lost it a bit haven't you? You know that Tiny Me and the other goddesses here care about everyone here and work hard to keep their citizens safe. They work together like friends should."

The man burst out laughing at Neptune's response.

"Dude, that is just plain rude!" Neptune huffed.

"Never mind that. So, on to business. You are Neptune, human of some alternate dimension to this one wherein you did not become a goddess. How is it you are able to travel through dimensions?"

"Oh, that? Pssh. Easy. Sort of. I just use my Nep-Note since I've got Crostie in it. I can use her powers while she is in my book."

"Do you mean that tiny fairy-like thing, Croire, taped into the book with the big mouth?"

"That's the one. Wait. You didn't let her out didja?!" Neptune asked frantically, praying that Croire hadn't escaped.

"No. A girl with a big mouth like that, promising the world in return for her freedom? She'll be all air and no substance, she won't keep that promise and she damn well would have no intention of keeping it." The man told Neptune.

Neptune let a big sigh of relief loose.

"Man, that's a relief. Takes me hours, days even, to capture her every time someone lets her out."

The man started asking questions about Neptune, her affiliation with the goddesses here, her own dimension and the goddess candidates. Neptune gave responses, not offering anything more than what would be common knowledge. After a while, filled with more questions, the guard returned.

"My Lord, Major Mason has requested your presence in the Command Bunker. There is a message waiting there."

The man nodded at the guard and turned to Neptune.

"I suspect I shall see you again in the future. While I cannot let you go now, rest assured that you will be looked after here." He unlocked the cell, walked out and locked the door behind him. "I'll have one of the guards procure you a pack of cards, if only to try and keep your sanity intact."

Neptune got and leaned against the bars as the two men walked off. She listened intently as they talked.

"...another ten trainloads of coal will be sent through the portal tomorrow. So, which agent sent the message?"

"Firebrand, My Lord."

* * *

 _Present time._

"I'm guessing this 'portal' is something special. What about that 'quake that hit recently?" Neptune asked Vert.

"None of us are certain. Histoire said that earthquakes do not happen on Gamindustri due to the stability of the tectonic plates here, so who knows? What is this portal, though? Could it be some kind of large scale inter-dimensional travel device?" Vert thought out loud.

Neptune sat on the floor and crossed her legs. She picked the pack of cards out of her pocket and began shuffling them to play Solitaire again.

"What was the name of that spy again?"

"Firebrand, I think. Been a while. I could be mistaken." Neptune shrugged her shoulders as she dealt the cards out.

Vert retired to her bed and pondered over things. Who exactly was this leader? What is this portal? Do they really come from another world? How did she end up here? Questions kept spinning in her head and she had no answers.

Vert was shaken out of her thoughts by the sound of a door being thrust open. She could make out the sound of several pairs of feet walking down the corridor. Four men stopped outside her cell.

"Hey there boss guy! Come to see cute, little ol' me again have you?" Neptune asked hopefully.

"No. Not this time. I've come to see the goddess." He replied as the guard opened the door to Vet's cell.

The leader walked in and the door was shut and locked behind him, all three other men then withdrawing weapons and aiming them at Vert.

"My, how rude of you! Capturing a goddess, leaving me locked up without so much as a basic game to play. No greetings and aiming guns at me! Handcuffing me as well! Don't you know how to be polite?" Vert started airing her grievances.

"Shut up, goddess!" The voice boomed from the leader.

Vert was a little shocked by the ferocity of the voice and kept quiet immediately.

"You, goddess Green Heart, are in the presence of a god! I am Grey Heart. You are my prisoner. Your escape will not happen, since I have cut off your access to Share Energy." Grey Heart explained Vert's situation to her.

"Heavens, I've never heard of any gods before, but I'm sure if they all act like you, I can see why I've never met a god before." Vert insulted the god.

"Think what you may, Green Heart, but your insults will not yield anything positive for you. All you need to know is that soon I shall broadcast to the whole world that the end of the goddesses is nigh and that only I can protect them. I shall show the nation of Leanbox that their goddess is weak and incompetent. Your 'friends' Purple Heart and Black Heart could not save you, both forced to escape when they tried to face me in combat. Soon, all your followers will become my followers." Grey Heart grinned at Vert.

"Dear me, do you think that one simple loss will sway my beloved followers? That wasn't the first time I've been defeated in battle and I dare say it won't be the last. My followers are not so fickle as to be swayed by a simple defeat. They put their faith in me when times are good and bad, they will not turn so easily. Mark my words, Gray Heart." Vert narrowed her eyes at her jailor.

"That is Grey Heart. With an 'e', not an 'a'. And I do not expect ALL your followers to leave you straight away, just some will be enough. With each defeat inflicted upon Gamindustri's goddesses, more and more will put their faith into me. You cannot deny the fact that there will be a minority of your uncertain followers who will use your loss as an excuse to stop believing in you."

The words were true in Vert's mind. She looked down at her feet and tightened her grip on her dress. She wouldn't give the god a response.

"But...there is one thing, Vert."

Vert looked up at the mention of her human name.

"Against my better judgement I have been advised to not slay you and your compatriots. Believe me, if I had it my way we wouldn't be talking right now, so I will give you an opportunity to pledge your allegiance to me. By giving up your goddess powers and fully becoming human, I will grant you your place in my politics cabinet. You will still lead Leanbox's everyday rule, but you will serve under me and reinforce Leanbox's citizens place their faith in my leadership."

Vert raised an eyebrow and chuckled.

"You think I would give my nation up to you? That I would give my very self up? I would rather die in service to my people than become your pawn. No." Vert's face hardened as she glared at the god.

"Hey, don't throw the off away completely, Miss Busty. It's not a bad deal, you know? Could be worse." Neptune threw her opinion in.

Grey Heart and the other men all turned to look at Neptune who, as usual, was leaning against the metal bars of her cell.

"I mean, don't agree to it either but keep it as an open suggestion." She said, shrugging her shoulders.

There was a beeping sound, which stopped any rebuttal from Vert. One of the men withdrew a pager from his pocket and read the message that he had been sent.

"My Lord, important message from one of the field agents. General Brodrick requests your presence in the Command Bunker immediately."

"Very well, Sergeant." Grey Heart turned back to Vert. "Three days, Green Heart. Your public humiliation will commence. Think about serving me, it may just save your life."

With that, Vert's cell was opened, the god exited, and then it was locked again. The god bid farewell to Neptune and left with the three other men following.

Vert sighed and lay back on her bed. She hoped the other goddesses would stage a rescue attempt soon.

"Dawww, man. I was gonna challenge him to a rousing game of strip poker if he didn't have to dash off." Neptune casually said as she returned to her own bed.

"Were you...just being serious there?" Vert dared to ask, shocked that _any_ Neptune would be serious.

Neptune leaned forwards to look at Vert and merely shrugged her shoulders in a non-committal response.

* * *

 _Flashback: Just before Vert's incarceration._

IF had made her way into the base and had waited for an opportune moment to inspect the large containers that had been brought in. It had taken a lot of patience, patrols were regular enough to limit the speed at which she could move without much risk. She had enough time to quickly peruse one container at a time for roughly one minute, with the amount of time decreasing the further away each container was. The three blue containers had various large scale weaponry and ammunition in them, none fit for a human to handle due to their immense size and undoubted weight. From her hiding spot, she surmised that they were most likely destined for the ship offshore. She took a few photos of the weapons inside the containers; giving the goddesses some knowledge of what they were up against would be most beneficial. The white containers were something of a relief and a letdown. Nothing more sophisticated in them than what was a new coffee grinding machine and general equipment fit for kitchens, bedrooms and living rooms.

 _'I think those red containers are what I really need to have a look at.'_ The Planeptune agent thought to herself as she sneaked away from her current hiding place.

As IF carefully made her way through the complex, she stopped when she saw a person, a man, flying through the air and land near a building close to the cliff face not too far away from her current position. She could see that he was carrying someone...with blonde hair. Wearing a predominantly green dress.

 _'Lady Vert?'_ IF was fairly certain that she was correct in identifying the woman being carried.

IF pressed her lips together and let a small sigh out through her nostrils. Her plan to investigate the red containers would have to be shelved for the time being while she would have to verify Vert's condition. IF crept closer to see a single uniformed soldier approach the man carrying Vert and give the man a salute. If IF didn't know better, she was convinced that she was looking at some male version of a goddess. The processor units, the size of the man and the fact that he just now changed form before her eyes. Many feelings welled up within IF's soul at this sight and she wanted to run away back to Planeptune as fast as possible. Only to report what she had seen, mind you. Nothing to do with being a bit afraid. Nope, IF does NOT do being scared. Not in the slightest.

Anyway, the soldier, after a brief conversation with the man carrying Vert, opened the door to the building and the goddess was taken inside. A mere two minutes later, the man exited the building and vacated the area, IF having to ensure she was hidden as he came close to her. IF resumed her course and snuck past the building, taking a moment to peer inside it since the door was still open. She quickly appraised that it was a prison of some sort and the guard was currently engaged in conversation with someone further down, IF couldn't risk getting closer without being seen. With that done, she set off in search for those elusive red containers again.

 _'I'll take a stab at a guess here and assume those red containers will contain something for the military here. With those tanks being taken with the red containers, it wouldn't surprise me if the containers were filled with a mix of infantry supplies and vehicular supplies. Mostly ammunition.'_

IF had to backtrack to use the path back up the cliff she had traversed on her way down to the other containers. She couldn't use ones further along due to the lack of cover provided by them, plus the activity of military personnel and civilians around the entire base would mean trying to just sneak along through the base would be next to impossible without being spotted at some point. Being in the cover of the trees near the top of the cliff would provide her enough cover from being seen from people not actively looking for an intruder. She would still have to be slightly cautious in avoiding detection, but IF was confident in her abilities to remain undetected.

Half an hour passed and IF had moved further along the cliff top to the next part of the base. She had to cross a dirt road at one point where she had remained in hiding to witness three lorries pass, all carrying coal, logically destined for the power plant. She allowed herself a moment to muse on the repetitiveness of the job for the drivers. IF would find such a job quickly becoming boring for her, but the simplicity of it and not having to worry about the safety of an entire planet were both something she could find appealing, even if it was just a bit.

When IF reached her destination, her mood dropped. Indeed, she had found the freight train she was looking for with those red containers, but there was a LOT of military personnel around here. The tanks were in the middle of being unloaded from their respective flatbeds and security of tight. Plenty of soldiers on patrol and in groups of at least four. Every building that IF could see had at least two soldiers stationed outside them. There was also one particular structure that caught the Planeptune agent's eye - it was about fifteen metres tall or so, had a pair of tanks stationed next to it and the top part of the structure was rotating with four 'arms' pointed up towards the sky. IF could hear a faint humming sound that it was emitting as well.

 _'Could this be the jammer affecting communications around here?'_ IF thought as she took a photo of it. _'Looks like I'll have to hang around for a while. Even if I can't get to inspect the containers, I should be able to gather a lot of information here.'_

With her current plan set, IF started gathering her information for the goddesses.

To Be Continued...


	6. Chapter 5

Chapter 5: Processor Problems

The afternoon had started to turn into evening. The glorious sunlight that had bathed the base along the coast to the far south of Planeptune was starting to set. More and more artificial forms of light were being turned on to replace the natural light from space.

IF was getting bored of her information gathering now. She was hungry and getting tired, plus her patience was starting to wear thin. She had watched patrols for several hours now and there was little change to the routine of the guards. Sure, their patrol numbers had dropped to pairs and their rounds had become less frequent, but the lack of cover around the red containers provided IF with no low risk opportunity to inspect even one of them. All of the tanks had been craned off the flatbed trucks while the locomotive attached to the collection of freight remained silent. IF could only hope that, at the very least, the containers would be emptied soon if she couldn't get to them herself.

Still, very little changed. A couple of hours passed and IF was starting to get fatigued. She was left now with two options - either she made a move on one of the containers now or go home. Regardless of what she would do it would be nightfall before she made it back to Planeptune, and one major lecture from Histoire would be awaiting her in the morning. IF groaned when the thought of Neptune teasing her over being lectured by Histoire, an opportunity the Guardian CPU would not fail to miss nor let her forget in a hurry.

"I'm screwed either way, but if I can get some extra hard intel, then maybe I can get away with it." IF whispered as she started to make her move on the containers.

The land up at this end of the base was at a higher elevation than near the portal so the trip down the cliff was much easier to traverse and slightly better covered thanks to the foliage and the number of buildings that had been constructed here. IF thought of a plan on her way down: Open one container in stages between patrols and just pray they didn't pay any attention to them. Each container had four bolts to move to unlock the container's doors. When the doors were unlocked, IF would end up having to hide inside one and pray her timings were accurate to avoid being seen upon her exit, to which she would have to lock the doors again to cover her tracks for a trouble free (hopefully) return home.

The next ten minutes were spent by IF implementing her plan. She found that the ground around the containers was much sandier than she anticipated, so that added an extra layer of complexity in trying to erase her footprints enough to appear un-noticeable in the failing light. Stepping in prints made by patrolling guards helped to some degree, and made the spectacle of her moving sideways between her hiding spot and the container in question rather amusing, if anyone could watch it unfolding. Upon reaching the container she still had to carefully maintain her balance while stepping on the buffers of the flatbed wagons the container was on and the one behind as well. The buffers weren't exactly designed for people to stand on them. However, fortune was on her side and she managed to make it inside without being detected, even the doors to the container were kind enough to not make a loud audible noise as she carefully opened and closed them.

"Now, what have we here?" IF whispered to herself as she pulled out one of her phones and switched it on, using it as a makeshift flashlight.

It was no surprise to her that the container was filled with weapons designed for human use. However, while they looked like normal weapons employed by Gamindustri's own Basilicom forces, there were clear differences in certain areas. None of these weapons looked like they used standard kinetic rounds like her own pistol that she uses from time to time. Upon closer inspection, IF picked up what looked like an ammo magazine. Shining her light on it she was able to see that it reflected a red glow. It looked more like some kind of oversized battery.

"Hmm."

IF placed the cell on the floor next to her feet and reached over and removed one of the rifles from the holding it was secured in. Kneeling down, she placed her phone so it shone on the floor in front of her. She gave the rifle a look over and quickly found a rather large box shaped hole in the top of the rifle. Picking up the cell, she slotted it into the rifle with ease. An audible click signified that the cell had been locked into place. IF gave an approving nod as she held the rifle against her shoulder and took aim at the back of the container. She wanted to pull the trigger and see what it was capable of, but that would end badly for her. She sighed and pulled on the cell. After a few moments of tugging, the cell detached from the rifle and IF put both the cell and rifle back where she had found them.

Investigating the rest of the contents of the container gave IF just what she needed. There were more types of weaponry, with respective power cells to fit them, armour for protecting various parts of the body (mainly vital organs) and several pairs of uniquely designed handcuffs. These caught IF's eye and her curiosity meant she just had to pick a pair up. The inner circular area, where ones wrists would be placed for the handcuffs to be locked shut, were covered in thin layer of fabric. There were also three locks for one key, the first two to open and close each handcuff on the wearer (prisoner) and the third, as IF discovered after playing around with them for a few minutes, could increase and decrease the amount of chain links between each end, effectively allowing some small form of relative freedom to the captive (the cuff that went around the captive's left wrist had a metallic box fitted onto the cuff where the extra links were housed).

"I think I'll take these back with me. It'll be something interesting for someone to have a look at if nothing else. Perhaps taking a gun back too would be good since I bet Uni would love to see how they differ from what she has."

IF looked over the available weapons and decided on what looked similar to a sniper rifle. It may be harder to sneak one of these out but it could prove useful somewhere down the line.

With a weapon, respective power cell and handcuffs, all there was left to do was for IF to make her escape. She carefully opened one of the container doors very slightly so she could see when the next patrol came past. The seconds ticked past and IF was starting to get anxious. In a way, she was relieved when she heard the voices of a man and a woman talking together as they walked past, neither noticing the container door slightly ajar. IF quietly let loose a sigh of relief as she opened the door and made her way back over the original hiding spot where she deposited the sniper rifle and handcuffs. She then had to get back over to the container to close the door in the same manner as she did breaking into it. She fretted a little about getting caught or accidentally leaving a clue to indicate that someone had been here who shouldn't have been but by using the same technique that had got her in, she was able to shut and bolt the container up again without being seen. IF was able to carefully make her escape with her stolen goods. Once clear from the immediate vicinity of the base, she just now had the trek back to Planeptune as the final action of her day.

"I hope Nep appreciates all I did to get these."

* * *

 _Earlier in the day, after Grey Heart was called away from his interrogation of Vert._

Grey Heart entered the command bunker followed by the soldiers who had been with him in the prison. All the men and women gathered there stood and saluted him as he walked in. Grey Heart nodded and they all resumed their duties.

"Bring me up to speed, General." Grey Heart commanded the senior officer.

"My Lord, reports from our Loweean operatives say they have been unable to find out what White Heart's task was. However, they do report that White Heart set off for an unknown area by herself, however they were unable to track her. They also report that the CPU Candidates, Rom and Ram, both left for Planeptune only a short while ago. One of our Planeptune agents had verified that both are on their way, plus the Lastation CPU Candidate, Uni, too." Brodrick explained.

The god ran a hand across his chin and thought for a while.

"Have Black Heart and Purple Heart returned yet?"

"We have not received any updates stating they have, my Lord, but I suspect this will change within the next thirty minutes or so. Do you think this gathering of goddesses will signify conflict soon?"

"More than likely, General. I expect the inability to contact Green Heart will have raised suspicions that something isn't right, and with the testimonies from both Purple Heart and Black Heart upon having escaped from fighting me, they will most likely stage a rescue to get their comrade back."

"What are your orders, Lord Grey Heart?" Brodrick asked.

"Perhaps it is time for the whole of Gamindustri to know of our presence - the citizens will find out eventually anyway. I want our teams across each nation to hack all the airwaves so we can broadcast the public humiliation of Green Heart worldwide. If we can turn their followers into my followers, we can strike a significant blow to the goddesses before any large scale battles can take place."

"As you command, my Lord."

"I shall be aboard _Epsilon_ should you need to contact me."

* * *

 _Planeptune: Thirty minutes later._

Nepgear had been busy trying to clear the interference that was disrupting the communications between the nations and the goddesses. All her efforts in changing frequencies and trying to filter things out had met with no success. She had found the ordeal vexing and worrying, but yet she couldn't help but feel amazed by the whole thing at the same time. Uni, Rom and Ram had come over at Histoire's request to try and give her a hand while they waited for Blanc to return with Uzume.

"Ugh! This is so frustrating!" Nepgear blurted out in a rare show of emotion. "Nothing I try works! What good am I if I can't sort out some interference?!"

"Hey, calm down Nepgear. You need to keep it together or you'll miss something." Uni told Nepgear as she set a cup of tea down next to her friend.

Nepgear sighed and rubbed her forehead.

"Indeed. Do not get discouraged if this cannot be done, Nepgear. We can only hope that IF, Neptune, Noire and Vert, return soon with information for us. I'm certain that at least Noire will have tried to contact us." Histoire tried to console the only competent Planeptune goddess.

Nepgear took a long sip of the tea and released a more relaxed sigh.

"Thanks you two. I know I'm not that helpful but tech is supposed to be my thing and if I can't sort this out, then who will? I suppose I should look at this as a challenge rather than a source of frustration." Nepgear smiled at Uni and Histoire.

"Taking guns apart, maintaining them and rebuilding them is my speciality, so helping you with this is way out of my league, but I'll help you in any way I can." Uni turned her head away from Nepgear.

"Thank you, Uni. I really appreciate you helping me." Nepgear beamed.

"B-but, it's not like I'm doing this just for you, y'know. I-it's just that...helping our big sisters is our duty as CPU Candidates." Uni's cheeks were bright red as she used her typical tsundere lines.

Histoire quietly chuckled at the exchange, making her think of some of the conversations between Neptune and Noire that ended up with Noire engaging her tsun mode. Her musings were interrupted by Ram bursting in through, thankfully not literally, the large glass doors to one of the balconies.

"Hey! Hurry! Neptune and Noire are back!" Ram shouted.

All eyes turned to the only left hander in the group.

"Well, c'mon you dummies! Don't stand there gawking at me!" Ram yelled as she ran back outside.

Nepgear, Uni and Histoire quickly followed and joined Rom and Ram.

"Look! Miss Neptune and Miss Noire are in trouble!" Rom pointed to the shiny objects in the sky approaching the Basilicom.

Indeed, Black Heart was struggling to keep in the air while carrying Neptune.

"Come on Noire! Pick up the pace and keep your flight pattern smoother! Are you tryin' to tip me off?!" Neptune 'encouraged' the Lastation CPU.

"SHUT UP! You are far too damn heavy! I'm absolutely shattered and it is taking everything I have to keep us in the air! Maybe if you weren't so useless in that fight, you wouldn't have lost your processor units, and we would've been back ages ago!" Black Heart argued.

Considering what Black Heart has said, if she was struggling like she claims, surely she wouldn't be able to argue as vehemently as she is?

"Hmm, yeah, I'd have to agree with the author on this one. You are exaggerating again, Noire."

"Like hell I am! Ugh!" Black Heart suddenly dipped and rolled.

"Hey! Stop trying to ditch me!" Neptune clutched onto Black Heart's waist for dear life.

Black Heart was able to regain some altitude and steady herself as she approached the Basilicom. She pushed herself forwards and began her final approach, hoping she would be able to make it. If she didn't, well, let us be honest; both girls are goddesses and neither will die from the fall. It would just be an inconvenience having to pick themselves up, dust off, and then make their way up to the top of the Basilicom. Plus the financial inconvenience for Histoire in having whatever damage caused repaired.

"Come on Noire! You can make it!" Uni shouted, cupping her hands around her mouth.

"They'll make it! Won't they?" Rom asked.

"Of course they will. I think." Nepgear was less than convincing.

"They'll make it. If it was Neptune carrying Noire, then they'd be done for." Ram said as she turned away, seemingly bored with the event taking place.

"Uh-huh, uh-huh." Rom agreed with her twin.

"Aw, Neptune is more reliable than that. Maybe. I think." Nepgear still was unconvincing.

Histoire sighed and silently agreed with the twin sisters.

Neptune was able to pull herself up and onto Black Heart's back. She got into a crouched position and readied herself to jump. At the right moment she kicked off of Black Heart and reached out for the railing.

"Hyyaaaahhhhhhh!" Neptune screamed.

"Ahhhhh!" Black Heart screamed.

Poor Black Heart had been knocked off course by Neptune, so while Neptune was just able to grab onto the railing, Black Heart smacked into the concrete wall below the railings. Fortunately for her, Uni was able to grab onto her foot as her legs came up and stop her from falling head first to the ground.

"Phew! Made it." Neptune breathed a sigh of relief as Nepgear helped her over the railing. "Thanks Nep Junior."

"NEPTUNE! Thank goodness you're safe! I was so worried about you!" Nepgear wailed as she gave her sister a crushing hug.

"Ack! Nep...Junior...can't...breathe." Neptune squeaked.

"Hey! That jump was totally awesome! It was like something out of an action movie!" Ram said excitedly.

"Yeah! Totally awesome!" Rom agreed as the twins gathered around Neptune.

"Hey! A little help over here!" Uni called as she struggled to pull Black Heart. up.

"Come on! Help me up!" Black Heart shouted angrily.

"I'm trying, Noire!" Uni defended herself.

"Not you! Them! NEPTUNE! Get your ass over here and HELP ME UP!"

"Alright, geez. Don't get your leotard in a twist, Angry Heart." Neptune rolled her eyes as Nepgear released her.

"Oh! I'm so sorry, Noire! I didn't mean to forget about you, honest." Nepgear apologised as she ran over to help Uni.

"Lame!"

"Miss Noire is scary when she's angry." Rom shied away and looked at her feet.

"You made Rom sad, you big dummy!" Ram shouted at Black Heart.

Black Heart's eye twitched. She really wanted to lay into Ram right now, but doing so would only cause her much more grief later on. Like when Blanc arrives and hears about it and then goes on a violent rampage against Lastation. But, with the help of Nepgear and Neptune, Black Heart was lifted up over the railing where she collapsed onto the concrete floor and deactivated HDD. With her human form sprawled out, she closed her eyes and took several deep breaths.

"I apologise, but what happened out there? Why did you, Neptune, not return in your own HDD form? Where is Vert? Why is Noire so exhausted? Why weren't we able to contact you?" Histoire asked many questions of the two goddesses.

"Um, yeah, we kinda got into a fight with some self-righteous dude. Claimed to be some kind of god or something like that." Neptune began.

"Excuse me? A god? Got into a fight?" Histoire piled on more questions.

"I dunno! You're the cute, knowledgeable book fairy here, Histy, not me. And yeah, we got into a fight because he was trying to kidnap Vert." Neptune continued.

"So, where is Vert then? I assume you rescued her? Why didn't she return to Planeptune with you and Noire?" More questions from the Oracle.

"Erm...well...how do I put this..." Neptune stalled.

"Neptune got her ass handed to her on a plate and had her processor units destroyed, which is why I was carrying her. That bastard is frickin' tough and both of us couldn't take him down so Vert is currently in his possession." Noire interrupted, still lying on the floor.

"HEY! That's not true! He sexually harassed me! Grabbed hold of my gigantic gazongas and gleefully groped me and then threw me head first into Useless Heart here!" Neptune desperately tried to defend herself.

"Oh goodness! You were sexually harassed?! How horrible!" Nepgear cried out, holding her fingers over her mouth in shock.

"I-I'm not useless, damn it Neptune! And don't embellish the truth to make yourself look like an innocent victim! Neptune wasn't sexually harassed. He grabbed her, admittedly by her chest, and threw her into me. It was easy to tell just how dumb Neptune is as her thick skull nearly knocked me out upon impact." Noire couldn't resist throwing an insult towards Neptune.

"You're so stubborn that your head is the one that is hard as a mountain, Noire! You could have broken my adorable nose, or fractured a cheek bone or something." Neptune retorted while pointing an index finger as the worn out goddess.

The two goddesses continued bickering while the Candidates sighed at what was playing out before them. Histoire was starting to get fed up since the questions she had asked were now not being answered.

"ENOUGH! Your pointless arguing has completely derailed the whole conversation! All of you get inside now and we will have a full debrief. No-one is allowed to leave until all reports have been filed!" Histoire shouted at the CPUs.

"H-Hey! No fair! We didn't do anything wrong!" Uni protested.

"Yeah! This is just mean!" Ram agreed.

Rom nodded in agreement with her sister.

"Ohhh. I got in trouble and I wasn't even arguing." Nepgear moaned as her shoulders slumped.

"IN! NOW!" Histoire repeated, pointing a tiny index finger in the direction of the door.

"Great going, Noire, you got us in trouble now." Neptune huffed.

"M-me?! I clearly wasn't the one in the wrong here. You brought this on all of us with your falsehoods. Maybe if you just told it like it happened for once..." Noire purposely trailed off.

"Oh no, no, no, no, my dear Noire. You problem is that you pick at every tiny detail whereas I just don't sweat the small stuff. That's why I'm the protagonist and you are just the tsundere loner sidekick."

"I-I'm NOT a loner or a sidekick! I had my own game, dammit! I mean, Blanc had to share a game with you and Vert wasn't even the protagonist on what SHOULD have been her game. Need I remind you again that I BEAT you in a popularity poll. **I** was number one!"

Neptune was about to respond to Noire's boast when Histoire stopped her.

"Again! Stop this bickering right now! I want facts about what exactly the two of you saw, not who is the most popular goddess amongst fans!" Histoire ranted. "Now, Noire. Tell me very clearly what happened."

The tone of Histoire's voice was filled with anger and frustration. She looked like she was about to snap and turn into a very mini crazy White Heart - minus the axe, of course.

"Okay, okay, geez. We intercepted some man with Vert. Vert was out cold and we ended up fighting him to rescue her, but he was, and I am pained to say this, too strong for both of us to take down. He has immense power, akin to us CPUs and he had two weapons." Noire explained as she furrowed her brow as she played out the scenes in her mind again.

"Yeah! He's a freakin' cheater! He somehow hacked the rules and got another weapon!" Neptune interrupted.

"Vert was captured by this mystery CPU-like person?" Histoire asked.

"Yeah, pretty much. He broke all of Neptune's processor units and forced her out of HDD, which meant I had to either save Neptune or Vert. And I'm regretting my choice." Noire sighed.

"You know you love me, Noire, but that tsun-tsun nature of yours means you'll never be honest with your feelings and you'll live a lonely, boring existence. Honestly, I wonder if in your game your poor secretary ever got anywhere with you, He'd have been better off with any other of us CPUs. At least we'd have happily showered him with the love and affection he deserved...maybe. Vert would have showered him with co-op gaming marathon sessions instead, and Blanc would probably would have kept him as a librarian or something, but it's more than you'd ever do. At least I'd have given him lots of love, especially if he made pudding. I doubt you would have even kissed him after five years."

"Neptune..." Histoire's angry voice returned.

Neptune cleared her throat and smiled sweetly at Histoire. Noire looked like she was about to explode and go on a violent rampage.

"Oh, miss Noire looks scary again. Like miss Histoire." Rom said in a quiet voice as she took a few steps back to get behind Ram.

"Neptune, please activate your HDD mode." Histoire said flatly.

"Huh? Why?" Neptune wore a confused look on her face.

"Just do it."

"Aye-aye, Captain." Neptune rolled her eyes as she activated HDD.

Or Neptune tried to. Normally it is a quick process to turn from human form to goddess form but Neptune was struggling. She grunted and strained for around a minute, with all present wondering why the process was so difficult for her, except Noire who actually worried that by having her processor units destroyed, Neptune wouldn't be able to engage HDD again. Not that she'd ever tell Neptune she was worried for her.

 _'I'm not a tsundere!'_ Noire thought as she tried to deny the truth.

"T-there. I...I've done it...I'm exhausted." The seductive voice of Purple Heart wearily said.

"Oh. My. Goodness! Neptune! What happened to you?!" Nepgear called out with worry written over her face and in her voice.

"Oh my! This isn't good at all." Histoire shook her head.

"Hey! I bet I can beat Neptune in a fight right now only using one spell! Wanna see Rom?" Ram boasted to her twin.

"Yeah! Yeah! Show me, Ram!"

Noire and Uni both looked shocked at what they were seeing. While Purple Heart stood (she was down on one knee to be accurate) before them, she looked like she was about to fall to pieces. Share energy flickered around her critically damaged processor units, all of which had reformed into the original shapes, but they were covered with masses fractures and most still had pieces missing to them.

"I don't know...how much...longer I...can...maintain...this form." Purple Heart wheezed as she placed a hand on her chest.

They all got closer to Purple Heart, Nepgear kneeling down in front of her sister and placing her hands on Purple Heart's shoulders.

"Neptune..what is going on?" Nepgear asked.

Purple Heart shook her head. She was too tired to theorise about her current lack of strength or why her processors were like this. All she could think about was changing back into her human form and sleeping for a few weeks. Nepgear, ever the mad scientist, allowed her curious mind to get the better of her and reached out for her crown (processors on Purple Heart's head). As Nepgear's slender fingers gently touched one, the whole unit literally shattered with tiny fragments falling down all over Purple Heart, with the sound of the breaking replaying itself in everyone's ears. Nepgear's eyes widened and a look of horror appeared on her face. Purple Heart exhaled and collapsed, transforming back into her human form.

"Neptune! Are you alright?" Histoire called out.

"Neptune! I'm sorry! Please wake up!" Nepgear wailed.

"Uhh." Neptune moaned. "I'm sleepy. Let me sleep."

"Wow. How anticlimactic." Noire commented as she folded her arms across her chest and turned her head to one side.

"It would be best if Neptune were to rest in her bed for the time being. Nepgear, Uni, please take her there. Rom, Ram, please assist Nepgear and Uni in looking after Neptune. I'll call Compa to come over." Histoire issued orders to the Candidates.

Within a few minutes the room had been cleared except for Noire and Histoire. Compa was on her way over to take over from the CPU Candidates in caring for Neptune who now was sleeping in her own bed.

"Noire..."

Noire was deep in thought, thinking about the battle again. Her mind playing through each move she made and how it had been countered. How they had foolishly thought at one stage they were going to win, and how quickly that 'victory' was stolen from them. What would have happened if she had made a dash for Vert and left Neptune behind instead? Is Vert even still alive?

"He was just gauging our strength..." Noire tailed off.

"This is something bigger than we've ever faced before." Histoire said as she flew over to Noire and floated in front of her.

"Yeah. This is bigger than ASIC ever were. Bigger than taking on Tari, heck, bigger than Uzume's original self." Noire shook her head glumly. "If we can't get Vert back, we will be screwed over."

"I have faith that all of the CPUs will resolve this matter quickly. This incident has only just begun and we cannot falter just because the opening exchanges have not gone well for us. This is why I wanted Uzume back - to provide you with some extra backup that you normally lack at the start. Gamindustri has not fallen on my watch and I'm not about to let it happen!" Histoire passionately claimed.

A faint smile crept onto Noire's lips as she looked at the Oracle of Planeptune.

 _'Yes, we may have lost the first battle, but the war has only just started. We've always succeeded in the end and I see no reason for us to fail this time.'_

* * *

 _Planeptune, that evening._

Light had started to fade from the sky with the cool, dark night slowly creeping in. Compa had arrived to care for Neptune in which the goddess had refused to be bandaged by the nurse-in-training, citing the bandaging being an effective way to slowly kill off any unwanted persons on the planet. This in turn did lead Neptune to suggest unleashing Compa upon the goddesses new enemy. That insult got Compa rather upset and thus she refused to make Neptune any pudding for the next month, much to Neptune's chagrin, and furiously apologising wasn't having an effect on getting her pudding privileges restored.

The tomfoolery aside, one person was relieved to be back in Planeptune. Of course, that person was IF. Even though all she wanted was to just sink into a hot bath and then go to sleep, there was still work to be done. She rubbed her right eye and yawned as she approached the guards to the Basilicom.

"Agent IF. Madame Histoire has been asking for you for quite a while." One of the guards said as IF pulled her identification card out from one of her pockets and showed it do him.

"Yeah, I figured as much. Signal was as good as dead where I was so I couldn't call anyone."

The other guard opened the door for IF so she could pass through. IF used the lift to get to the command room where she suspected Histoire would be. As she approached the room, she could hear faint voices coming from within, one of them definitely belonging to Histoire. Without so much as a knock, IF opened the door and slammed it shut to announce her arrival. All eyes turned to her.

"Iffy! Where have you been? I've been worried sick about you ever since I found out you had disappeared!" Compa wailed as she ran over to IF and threw her arms around her.

"Out doing recon."

"Where have you been, IF? Do you have any idea just how much I have had to deal with in your absence? You are in for a good scolding tomorrow!" Histoire warned.

"Got it. Sorry."

"We were so worried! I'm glad you're back safe and sound though." Nepgear joined Compa in hugging IF.

"I got it. Would you mind backing off for a moment?"

"Hmm. IF, you feel...harder...than normal." Nepgear commented as she gave a confused look to IF.

"Yeah...would you mind giving me a bit of space, please? Where is Nep, by the way?"

"Neptune is in her room recovering. She and Noire got into a fight with a strong opponent who beat them." Histoire told IF.

IF frowned as she thought about what to do.

"Organise an emergency meeting. Get all CPUs and Oracles on the line now as everyone needs to hear what I have to say. We are in serious trouble if we don't act properly in dealing with our new threat." IF ordered.

The others were hesitant to believe IF, but she looked deadly serious about this.

"Right. Nepgear, please get the others here. Compa, please fetch Neptune. I will call the Oracles."

Both Nepgear and Compa nodded their heads and left to fulfil their respective duties. As Histoire began calling the Oracles, IF approached her.

"Why is Nepgear getting the other CPUs? We can't wait for them all to journey over here."

"They are already here. I had all of them come here." Histoire sighed. "Vert has been captured."

"I know. I know exactly where she is, which is part of what I will be explaining when everyone is here."

"There has been no noticeable shift in the Sharicite, so she must still be alive."

"Yeah. she is but she is locked up in a jail cell."

Histoire continued asking IF questions until all the CPUs had been gathered. IF noticed that Uzume was among them and that both her and Blanc looked a lot more worn out than even Neptune did. Histoire had told IF in full about the battle that had taken place between the two goddesses and the alleged god.

"Iffy! You're back!" Neptune jogged over and hugged IF. "Where the heck didja go?"

IF felt embarrassed about being hugged in front of everyone, with the bright red blush on her cheeks not helping her. She gave Neptune a quick hug back before breaking the embrace and leaving Neptune pouting, complaining about IF being too tsun with her feelings and likening her to Noire. This, naturally, earned a death glare from said tsundere goddess.

The allies gathered around IF, with Mina, Chika and Kei joining in via video feed. The Leanbox Oracle was noticeably irritable despite the fact she hadn't said a word.

 _"Can we hurry this up? My darling Vert has been gone all day and not so much as contacted me or answered any of my calls! I need to spend all my waking moments mobilising the army to search for her."_

"This is precisely why you are called, Chika, for IF has information on Vert. So please be quiet and listen." Histoire calmly scolded the Oracle.

Chika huffed and folded her arms across her chest while wearing a rather pissed off expression on her face. Over dramatic, of course, but everyone remembers that Chika is the queen of BSing in an attempt to get her own way. Not that it works. At all, really. Not that Chika has ever paid much attention to that fact either.

IF rolled her eyes and cleared her throat as she prepared to speak.

"You know, I really should show you guys something first. A little...gift or two from my trip." IF told her companions as she undid her coat.

"Wow! Iffy is gonna strip in front of us! Quick! Cover Rom and Ram's eyes and tell the readers to stop reading too!" Neptune squealed as she ran over to Rom and covered her eyes.

Blanc quickly covered Ram's eyes while the others gasped. Rom and Ram both started complaining to no avail.

"For goodness sake! I'm not strippin' Nep!" IF shouted, her face flushing with more embarrassment.

"Oh. Y'know, I kinda didn't realise that you had done your oversized coat up until you started unbuttoning it." Neptune casually shrugged her shoulders and took her hands off of Rom's eyes.

Within her coat, IF unstrapped the laser sniper rifle and handcuffs and placed them down on the table in front of the view screen so the Oracles could see them.

"Oh, Iffy! Handcuffs? Are you into that masochistic and kinky kind of stuff? Really! Are you trying to corrupt our younger siblings!" Neptune blurted out.

This time, Neptune ran over to Nepgear and covered her eyes, causing the tech mad girl to start complaining. Compa took Neptune's place with Rom and covered her eyes and Blanc sighed in frustration and covered Ram's eyes again.

"Geez, IF! Don't bring that creepy stuff here!" Noire moaned as she covered Uni's eyes.

"Eww, that is so totally gross!" Uzume's squeaked in her valley girl voice. This was followed by Uzume coughing and clearing her throat. "Y'know, that stuff ain't cool at all."

"For *censored* sake! WHY ARE YOU ALL JUMPING TO CONCLUSIONS!?" IF roared angrily.

"Whew, thank goodness the author was able to slap that censor on Iffy there or we'd have to change the story rating from 'T' to 'M'." Neptune sighed in relief.

"Can we all just get serious for a few minutes before I burst a blood vessel?!" IF spat through gritted teeth.

The twitching of IF's left eye, along with the furious look on her face and the ragged breathing was enough for the CPUs to finally get their own acts together and stop their charade. Neptune cleared her throat and nonchalantly took her place where she had started off. The Oracles all wore expressions of boredom and mild annoyance; the antics of the CPUs being something they had all dealt with on a daily basis so this was pretty much normal for them. Histoire had spent the ordeal with her right hand slapped over her eyes and shaking her head while Neptune ran about like an attention seeking moron.

"Thank you." The least sincere thanks IF had ever said.

The brunette agent picked up the sniper rifle and held it out.

"This. This is the kind of thing we are facing here. Sniper rifle, but it isn't any kind of thing we have here; it doesn't use kinetic based damage but..." She took the battery pack out from within her coat. "...uses this. Some kind of energy based ammo that requires a sophisticated battery supply. I think you'd like to have a look at this, Uni, since you know everything there is to know about guns."

IF put the sniper rifle down along with the battery pack. She picked up the handcuffs and glared at Neptune, who was about to open her mouth, but wisely clamped it shut upon seeing IF's narrowing eyes. Neptune felt a shiver down her spine when the glare turned into a twisted grin as IF started taking purposely slow steps towards Planeptune's CPU.

"Hey, um, Iffy? What's happening?" Neptune asked nervously as IF's eyes lit up.

Neptune backed away as IF continued to take her measured steps towards her. Neptune was feeling very uncomfortable with lots of images whizzing through her mind as to what IF was planning to do with those handcuffs. She could feel sweat starting to run down the back of her neck as IF came closer and closer.

"Nope! Gotta run! Laters!" Neptune yelled as she turned to run away.

She would have got away if not for the quick reactions of Noire, who was able to grab hold of the back of her jersey dress as Neptune turned away.

"Oh no you don't!"

Noire yanked hard which caused the purple haired girl to fall backwards and land on her backside.

"Ow! What gives Traitorous Heart?!" Neptune turned her head and glared at Noire.

IF sprang into action as she saw her opportunity. She dashed over to Neptune, knelt down and attached the handcuffs and locked them before Neptune could even react. IF felt that there was something strangely satisfying about locking Neptune up in a pair of handcuffs. All the built up stress started to drain away from IF as she stood up, dusted her hands off and folded them across her chest with a smug look on her face.

"Hey! What did I do to deserve this? I'm the cute protagonist here! It doesn't state in my contract that I get handcuffed! If anyone is to be made to suffer this indignity then it should be Noire! She'd probably enjoy it."

"N-no I wouldn't! I-I'm NOT into that kind of thing! Geez!"

"Oh? What kind of thing are you into, Noire?" Blanc asked with a smirk on her face.

"T-that's none of your business! I don't have to blurt out my fantasies to you! You're more likely to want to be tied up than me!" Noire spat as she squared up to Blanc.

"Okay, okay. Enough of the teasing. We keep getting sidetracked here so it's making the plot advancement crawl along at a seriously slow pace." IF stood between Blanc and Noire and pushed them away from each other. "Now, Nep, what is it like wearing those?"

"Ya mean degrading? What am I? A criminal?" Neptune pouted as she tried pulling against the links.

"I mean, what are THEY like, not how you feel."

"Eh, constricting. But they do have this fabric-y thingy on the inside, so my wrists aren't being scraped raw by the metal. Even if my dignity has been taken from me, my beautiful skin won't suffer. How about taking these things off now, Iffy?"

"No."

"No? Why not?" Neptune whined.

"Iffy, you're being such a meanie to Nep-Nep." Compa pouted.

"I'm not. There is still something I want to do first." IF countered as she walked over to Neptune.

Using the key, IF inserted it into the extra keyhole on the left wrist restraint and turned it anti-clockwise, retracting several links before she stopped.

"Hey! What's the deal now, Iffy? I'm restricted enough without you restricting me further!" Neptune continued to complain about her current situation while pulling against her restraints.

 _"Interesting."_ Kei commented, her tone of voice resounding fascination over the handcuffs.

Mina frowned while Chika wasn't paying attention, most likely bored out of her mind since the conversation was nothing to do with Vert.

"Come on, Iffy! Please take these off now!" Neptune pleaded for her freedom.

IF scratched the back of her head as she thought about it. Letting Neptune out of them is what she SHOULD do, but seeing her like this made IF feel...good somehow. Like, finally getting back at her for every time Neptune had made fun of her or loafed about instead of working. It felt like Neptune was finally getting her comeuppance for acting about as far from a goddess as she possibly could.

"If y'ain't gonna let me go, Iffy, I'ma gonna get angry." Neptune warned.

"Iffy! Please let Nep-Nep go now, you've had your fun and this is just going too far for teasing her." Compa tried to convince IF again.

"No, I think keeping Neptune locked up will serve us best. We can force her to actually work with these as a reminder to her fate if she keeps slacking off." Noire suggested with an evil grin on her face.

"I can get behind that." Blanc nodded in agreement with Noire.

"No way! It's two versus one at the moment! C'mon, Nep Junior, you gotta back your big sis here." Neptune eyes Nepgear hopefully.

"Um..." Nepgear looked at the ground, squirming uncomfortably and pushing her index fingers together. "I-I actually agree with Noire and Blanc."

" _ **WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!**_ " Neptune screamed as loud as her voice would go. "My own sis, turning her back on me! Oh, you EARNED that backstabber ability in Ultra dimension alright!"

Looking over at the other CPU Candidates, Neptune was hopeful she could convince them.

"What about you guys?" Neptune asked.

"W-well...I think you...should DO some more work for your people. But! Y'know, maybe you should be let released?" Uni wasn't convincing with her spiel.

"Nah. It would be totally lame if you were let out now. More funny watching you react to this." Ram grinned with her face full of excitement.

"Uh-huh. Totally lame if you were let out." Rom, as usual, agreed with Ram.

"Before you ask, Neptune, we Oracles have no opinion on the matter." Histoire interjected as Neptune turned to face her.

"Way to sit on the fence, Histy." Neptune murmured. "Well, guess I'm gonna have to get myself out! Behold my power!"

Neptune turned on HDD to use her goddess strength to break the handcuffs apart.

"Now witne-...Huh?"

"Wow. Didn't expect to see you fail in activating HDD." Noire stated her observation.

Neptune was still Neptune; there was no Purple Heart to be seen here. Her HDD activation had failed.

"What gives? Where is my taller, stronger, sexier self?"

This event certainly got everyone to pay attention, even Chika.

"Maybe Nep-Nep doesn't have enough energy yet to use her goddess form?" Compa suggested.

"Given what we witnessed when Neptune first activated HDD when she and Noire returned earlier today, I believe she may not have enough share energy to willingly change into her goddess form as of yet." Histoire theorised.

"Wait. What happened earlier?" IF asked with a confused look on her face.

"When Neptune and Noire returned from their attempt to bring Vert back, Neptune's ability to activate her HDD mode was severely crippled. When she was able to change, all her processor units were barely holding together and they literally fell apart when touched. This all came about as they were attacked by a mysterious male with CPU-like powers." Histoire explained.

"I guess that is what you were referring to when I asked where Nep was?" IF sought conformation from Histoire.

Histoire nodded in response. IF thought back to earlier when she had seen Vert carried into the building that seemed to be serving as a jail. The man that took her there was undoubtedly the one Histoire was referring to now.

"I saw him. Saw him carrying Vert to what I believe to be a jail cell. As far as I could tell, she is still alive." IF repeated herself from earlier for the benefit of everyone else.

There was a thump and a crashing sound from the Leanbox feed as Chika burst into action.

 _"Where are they?! Where have they taken my darling Vert?! I will not rest until she has been returned to me! WHERE?!"_

"Hey, don't do anything rash. We still don't know their full army size and potential, and besides, if two goddesses failed against their leader, what chance do you have?" IF asked the Leanbox Oracle.

 _"Chika, don't do anything drastic. If you do, you could end up doing more harm than good."_ Mina warned her compatriot.

 _"Your overly emotional response is one of many reasons why you fail to make an acceptable Oracle for Leanbox. Acting on emotion in a situation as this will only cause trouble for you further down the line."_ Kei warned and insulted Chika at the same time.

"I fully agree; Chika, do NOT take matters into your own hand until we have formulated a plan on how to rescue Vert. We still haven't seen, never mind reviewed all the information IF has gathered." Histoire explained.

 _"Like any of YOU would act differently if your precious CPU was the one captured!"_ Chika sneered back.

The simple fact was that the other Oracles WOULD act differently. Chika was being Chika on the whole matter since it concerned Vert and that made her a problem for the other CPUs going forwards, until Vert had been rescued. Though, Chika did remain seated and kept the feed on, but she sat with her arms folded and was wearing the biggest pout anyone had ever seen.

"Hey, uh, girls? Anyone feel like, I dunno, letting me out of these things now?" Neptune asked, drawing attention to the fact she was still handcuffed.

"Really this just proves that you aren't as good a CPU as you think you are, Neptune. You can't even break out of some little handcuffs. What a hopeless goddess you are." Noire taunted Neptune with a very smug smile on her face.

"Oh yeah? If you are soooo amazing, Smug Heart, why don't you try breaking out of these?" Neptune challenged the raven haired goddess.

"You're on! I'll show you why I'm the best!" Noire narrowed her eyes at Neptune.

IF rolled her eyes and unlocked the handcuffs. Neptune cheered with joy at being freed while the others sighed, except for Compa and Uzume, who both started fussing over Neptune. IF locked Noire up in the handcuffs, then took her place next to Histoire.

"Whenever you're ready, Lady Noire." IF gestured at Noire.

"Now I'll show you how a CPU is supposed to be, Neptune!" Noire glared at her comrade.

Noire pulled against the handcuffs with all her might. The sound of clinking chain links and grunting from the goddess filled the room. Noire sure wasn't making this look easy at all.

"Pfft. Is that all you got, Noire? Weren't you gonna show me why you're the best?" Neptune taunted Noire as she struggled.

"SHUT UP! These things are tougher than I anticipated, that's all." Noire shouted as her face went bright red yet again.

"Why don't you try your HDD form?" Uni suggested tentatively.

Noire opened her mouth to snap back at Uni, but she stopped herself from doing so. Instead she just closed her mouth and silently agreed that her HDD form would be the best option to save face.

"Access!"

Only Noire was still left handcuffed. Black Heart was not standing before the others. The sight of a goddess stuck in her human form when she should be in her goddess form made everyone take note. Even Chika stopped brooding and focused on what was transpiring on the other side of video feed.

"Wha?! Why can't I transform? What the hell is going on Neptune? IF?" Noire hysterically asked as she started thrashing her arms about, trying to get the handcuffs off.

"Woooowww. Noire just flipped like a switch. Guess her arrogance has got the better of her." Neptune smirked as she enjoyed the show.

"Oh my. This looks rather troubling." Histoire said as she fell into deep thought.

"Hey, calm down Lady Noire, I'll take those off of you." IF approached Noire again.

Noire regained her composure for long enough to allow IF to take the restraints off of her. The moment they were off, she activated HDD again. This time she was surrounded by a bright light and within seconds, Black Heart stood before the others.

"Oh, thank Uranus for that! I'm me again!" Black Heart cried in relief as she looked herself over.

IF stared at the handcuffs she was holding with a frown on her face.

 _'I think we have just underestimated what we could well be up against here. If...if Vert is being held captive with this kind of thing, then only a rescue attempt from the goddesses stand any chance of success, and even that may be slim at best.'_

The war has not even officially begun yet and already Gamindustri's goddesses find themselves up against it. For now though, rescuing Vert remains their best hope of averting defeat.

To Be Continued...


	7. Chapter 6

Chapter 6: The Factory City

Morning had arrived at Planeptune. The previous night IF had returned and briefed the goddesses and Histoire on the results of her own unsanctioned scouting mission, eventually, after the usual messing about courtesy of Neptune. It wasn't the nicest morning that the citizens had ever been graced with as rain relentlessly lashed down in the city.

For Histoire, it had been yet another early start as she archived the events of last night and had summoned Uni to start her examination of the sniper rifle that IF had brought back. As she started archiving the official report from IF's unsanctioned scouting mission, she noticed that the handcuffs were mysteriously absent.

"I distinctly remember that IF left them next to the laser sniper rifle. I cannot imagine that Uni would have taken them, but..." Histoire tailed off as her brain kicked into gear. "Oh my! The curiosity of that girl will be the death of her, someday."

Histoire sighed heavily as she floated out of the control room and moved along the hallway to the elevator. She went down a couple of levels to where a certain pink haired tech loving imouto had her own workshop for tinkering and building various gadgets and gizmos. Tapping on the door, Histoire called out.

"Nepgear! Nepgear! Open up immediately! I know you have taken those handcuffs, but I cannot fathom a reason as to why!"

Histoire waited, but Nepgear didn't open up.

"NEPGEAR!" Histoire shouted as loud as she could.

"Erm...Histoire? I...can't open the door." Nepgear's muffled voice seeped out through the miniscule gaps between the door and doorframe.

"What do you mean 'can't'?"

"I...erm...I'm kind of...tied up at the moment and...I can't actually move. Oh golly, this is so embarrassing." Nepgear sheepishly explained her situation. "I think you'll need the Master Key to get in here. And rescue to me, too."

"Very well." Histoire sighed. "I'll be back with IF shortly. Don't go anywhere, Nepgear, as you are in for a scolding when this is over."

"Ohhhh." Nepgear whined as Histoire floated away to fetch IF and the Master Key.

* * *

Around fifteen minutes or so later, Histoire had returned with IF. IF was the main holder of the Master Key due to the fact she was the most competent person on the books of Planeptune's Basilicom employ. The Agent wasn't best pleased with being woken up earlier than normal, especially since it was Nepgear who was the one who had been the cause of this incident.

"If it had been Nep, then I could understand that. But you, Gear?" IF moaned as she unlocked the door to Nepgear's Engineering Lab.

The sight the Oracle and the Agent were greeted with made both of them stop in their tracks.

"Whoa! You should be glad this isn't a game, Gear, because if it was, the readers would be treated to a fanservice shot of you right now." IF grinned as she surveyed Nepgear's predicament.

"Ohh! I'm getting treated badly again. I was so hopeful that it would all change now." Nepgear whined.

Nepgear was head first on the ground with her hands stuck behind her back and her legs up in the air. I don't really need to tell you what exactly is on show, so I'll let IF do that instead.

"Gear, how'd you end up with you head on the ground and your legs in the air, revealing your panties to anyone and everyone who comes in here?" IF asked as she helped the CPU Candidate get to her feet.

"Goodness! Please don't draw attention to that, I'm embarrassed enough as it is! It's not an incident I'll look back on proudly at all." Nepgear sighed. "I was trying to figure out why Neptune and Noire couldn't activate HDD while wearing these. I thought that by wearing them myself I could learn more about them."

"And what are your findings, Professor?" IF cracked a devilish grin at Nepgear.

"That I need to pay more attention to what is around me instead of getting into a panic. I couldn't engage HDD myself and I couldn't summon my gunsword either. A long time ago, I had read that a human's legs are strongest part of the body, so I tried to use my right leg to hold the chain links down and break them by pulling against the force I was exerting with my leg, only I ended up slipping on some cabling I hadn't packed away and fell onto the back of my chair. But, since the chair is on wheels rather than solid legs, the chair rolled over and deposited me in the position you found me in." Nepgear explained.

"Well, that explains the chair on the floor, too." IF chuckled as she pulled the key out of her pocket for the handcuffs. "By the way, Gear, why do you and Nep wear socks that match the colour of your panties anyway?"

Nepgear's eyes widened as realisation hit her square in the face.

"What the goodness?! Wh-why didn't you say something earlier?! Why did you wait ten games, including remakes, and an anime series before telling me this! Ooohhhh! This day can't possibly get any worse! I'm really being treated badly yet again." Nepgear cried in distress.

"Wow. To be honest, I thought you were well aware of it, Gear. I bet Nep is." IF rubbed her chin as she enjoyed Nepgear's predicament a little too much.

"Why exactly are you bringing this up now? Why not when the story is elsewhere?" Nepgear asked.

"Eh, fanservice I guess. Y'know, the fans can't get artwork in a story so I suppose we have to give them something." IF replied, rather reluctantly accepting the fate of the Neptunia series.

"I don't see how this part of the conversation is relevant. Regardless, Nepgear, please don't let your curiosity get the better of you. I would expect this kind of horseplay from Neptune, but you are much better behaved than she is. I do not want a repeat incident of this! I am happy for you to continue your research into this item, but you will do so with my approval and someone to assist you. Is that clear?" Histoire scolded Nepgear.

"Yes, Histoire. I understand." Nepgear hung her head in shame as IF unlocked the handcuffs and took possession of them.

"Now, with that incident dealt with, I think it is time for some breakfast. After which we will all need to reconvene the meeting we had last night and start out strategy planning against this new threat." Histoire stated as the trio exited Nepgear's workshop.

* * *

A few hours later, everyone was back together again, minus Compa who had gone back to work at the hospital. Neither Histoire or IF had said a word about Nepgear's predicament earlier, much to her relief. Uni had spent the time meticulously examining the laser sniper rifle and was about to share her findings.

"To be blunt about it, we are up against people who know what they are doing. Their technology is impressive, having gone away from conventional kinetic based weaponry to advanced lasers. This sniper rifle functions pretty much the same as a normal sniper rifle would, but shoots a highly concentrated energy bolt at immense speed. The energy cell has enough power for twenty shots before depletion. One thing I did notice is the build up of heat from rapid fire which is a major drawback to the design of the weapon, especially since there is no efficient way of cooling with only a few designed gaps along the length of the rifle for the heat to escape from."

"So, are we to assume then that they are relatively advanced in their technological standings, yet far behind in some other areas then? Given IF's findings." Histoire asked.

"I think that is a fair assumption. I mean, I could already make several adjustments to this weapon and improve the efficiently of it." Uni answered.

"Uni, what about our own armies? Do you think they would stand a chance against this level of tech?" Noire asked, gesturing at the laser sniper rifle.

"If it were a short fight, then I think our armies may be in trouble. The damage this laser can inflict puts it above what our own armies weapons can do. The drawback, I assume, is that the lasers cannot have as much 'ammo' as our weapons can. I would assume the enemy army would have to carry more cells with them or have a charging station for depleted cells. A long fight would be better for us, I think."

"Are we to amass an army to rescue Vert, then?" Blanc inquired.

"I don't think storming down there with an army to rescue Lady Vert is the best idea." IF interjected. "At this stage, we don't know enough about the size of their own armed forces and needlessly putting lives at risk is only going to hurt us in the long run. Rescuing Lady Vert is something you CPUs would be better off doing, if merely due to the fact you guys can cover the distance a lot faster in your HDD forms."

There were nods and murmurs from all the goddesses as well as an affirmation from Histoire.

"It is agreed, the rescue of Vert will be undertaken by the CPUs. We need to plan for this and gather as much information as possible about our opponent's base of operations, so the rescue attempt shall begin in three days." Histoire stated.

A collective groan came in response.

"C'mon, Histy! Can't you work faster than that?" Neptune moaned.

"Maybe if _someone_ were of more help around here..." Histoire glared at Neptune.

"That's totally uncalled for, Histy! Iffy earns her keep around here, I'll have you know!" Neptune countered as she pointed at IF.

"Come on, Nep, you know Histoire was referring to you. Damn, and we were so close to getting through a scene without Nep ruining it." IF sighed.

"Hey! I just defended you, Iffy, and this is how you repay my loyalty?! Turncoat! Betrayer! You're like a snake in the pudding, Iffy!"

"Once again, another plot-advancing conversation devolves into whining and bickering. All courtesy of Neptune." Noire groaned as she rubbed her temples.

"That will be enough, everyone. Take a five minute break and we shall then continue. Neptune, you are excused from the rest of the meeting. Before you protest, go and do anything you want. Watch some anime on TV, play games on one of your many consoles or go and eat somewhere. I will fill you in later on with the details." Histoire ordered the series protagonist. "Consider yourself free from boring yourself to death."

"Woo-hoo! Pudding, here I come!" Neptune cheered as she dashed out of the room before anyone could even open their mouth, never mind say anything.

"I'm surprised, honestly. I thought she'd stay and troll us some more." Blanc commented as she stared at the doorway Neptune had exited through.

* * *

Once the break was over, the meeting had resumed. All the final points had been made and Uni had finished off her findings into the weapon. IF pulled Uni to one side as the goddesses filed out of the room.

"Did you use up all of the energy in the cell?"

"Yeah, pretty much. I don't think there is enough energy left in it for another shot. Why?" Uni asked.

"I was hoping to make use of it. Hmm." IF stroked her chin. "I wonder if Gear could build a charging point for the cell."

"I'm sure she could, but why do you want to use the sniper rifle?" Uni was curious of the Agent's motives.

"Hey, rescuing Lady Vert isn't going to be an easy task and I have a theory I'd like to put into practice before any rescue attempts are made. Also, do you think you could modify the rifle and have it ready in two days?"

"That is quite a tall order, considering I don't know if any mods would even fit it. It may be easily identifiable when compared with our own weapons, but they aren't exactly carbon copies. However, I suspect Noire will want to go back to Lastation pretty soon, so I could give it a go. Just get me a list of what you want and I'll see what I can do." Uni smiled at IF.

"Excellent, thanks Uni. I'll deal with the paperwork in getting the transfer of the rifle to Lastation sanctioned, but I'll keep the power cell so Gear can work on making the charging point. Thanks again, Uni, I'll text you the list of what I'd like." IF said to Uni as the brunette ran off to find Nepgear.

 _'Excellent. Even if Uni can't modify it, there is still everything to play for, so long as Gear can charge the battery cell up.'_

* * *

Neptune had been lazing around for a couple of hours. She had wanted to go out and buy some snacks, but she didn't fancy getting soaked in the process. Neptune had to be content with devouring what snack food was in the Basilicom while playing numerous games, oh the hard life of a Planeptune CPU...

Histoire floated in to observe Neptune in her natural habitat.

"Neptune, I have a job for you."

"Whaaaaat?! Can't Iffy or Nep Junior do it?" Neptune immediately protested.

"Well...yes they could, however, they are currently both busy and that leaves you to do your job."

"Hang on! What about Uzume? She's free."

"Uzume cannot do the task I have, since it involves going to the depths of LAN Castle, and she has not been there nor does she know where it actually is." Histoire stated.

"LAN Castle? That crummy, old place?"

"Yes. You, Neptune, are going to speak to your predecessor, Uranus, and ask her for help in our current plight. I expect you to be respectful of you senior, Neptune. Uranus was a formidable goddess in her time and she is the only goddess left from the first attempt to defeat the Deity of Sin. Her wisdom could be invaluable."

"That's cool and all, Histy, but shouldn't Nep Junior be the one to speak to her? Don't forget that Nep Junior was the one who destroyed Arbore with that super awesome Share Blade, not me." Neptune proudly reminded Histoire.

"Need I remind you that I AM a tome, Neptune. I am all too well aware that it was Nepgear who defeated the Deity of Sin, but still, she has work to do and you are currently free. Since you have already been in the presence of Uranus, she will be more accommodating to you, the designated Guardian CPU of Planeptune than Uzume or the other goddesses. Do not forget that in her time, Uranus and the goddesses of the other nations held a distinct amount of animosity towards each other."

Neptune groaned as she saved her game.

"Also, if you refuse to do this I will be forced to ban you from playing your games." Histoire warned.

"Really? You are going to ban the series protagonist from playing games?" Neptune voice was filled with scepticism as she raised an eyebrow at the Oracle.

"Yes. For three months."

Neptune pouted and huffed at Histoire as she very reluctantly stood up and abandoned her console. Poor Neptune, being forced to do work as the Guardian CPU of Planeptune...

"Hey! That text right there is mocking me again! Keep that up an-"

A change of scene will now take place.

* * *

While Neptune had been forced to do some work, over in Grey Heart's base, the god was reading over a message sent to him from his factory facility through the portal. General Brodrick had also been made aware of the contents of the message, given he was the most senior military person below Grey Heart. Both men were standing next to the portal, the transportation device powered up with the destination set.

"Will you be visiting Ravenskraigg, my Lord, or shall I go?" Brodrick asked.

"I will go myself, General, I would like to see firsthand what Captain Mannering is so excited about."

"Yes, my Lord, but you do remember not to stay there for more than four hours, yes?"

"Yes, General. I am only too aware of the negative share energy in that place. I may be several millennia old but my mind is still good at remembering things. I **was** pretty much the reason why that world is uninhabitable all manner of divine beings. I can never get over the perverse amusement of it really; it is a world prefect for all humans that do not want to be governed by a god or goddesses, yet in order to keep the world protected from such beings, they are required to place their faith into such a being. Sometimes I don't know if I should be glad of what transpired there or feel regret over it."

"Perhaps a bit of both, my Lord. I shall oversee things until you return." Brodrick saluted the god.

"Excellent, General, I know I can count on you." Grey Heart returned the salute before turning around and walking through the portal.

The factory city of Ravenskraigg was where all of Grey Heart's tools and armaments were created. The planet was virtually tidally locked as it orbited a blue-white 'A' class star, one rotation of the planet was exactly the same as one orbital period of the star. This meant the sun never moved through the sky so half the planet was in permanent daylight while the other half was in permanent darkness. This had led to the planet being named "Guardian's Folly" by both the gods and goddesses.

In ancient times, many gods and goddesses and tried to settle and claim the planet due to the extensive richness of natural resources here, but the extensive desert one side and the frozen wastelands the other meant that mining the resources was difficult at best. There were plenty of ruins of the previous settlements all across the twilight areas of the planet, virtually all wiped out when the gods and goddesses declared war on each other. Only one goddess had been successful in claiming this planet...

* * *

 _Flashback: 83 years ago_

The denizens of Guardian's Folly had been going about their struggling daily lives on the harsh climate of the planet. Their mundane routines of trying to coax as much yields out of their crops as possible in the bizarre climate of never seeing night time fall had proved difficult. When one labourer was on his way to fetch a hoe, a loud sound which was followed by a bright light appeared in front of him. He had to cover his eyes from the brightness of the light. As he peered at the light, it stabilised and he could see another land through the now shimmering light. Also, a rather tall person wielding a rifle with what were unmistakably processor units walking through the shimmering light. The labourer froze in fear at the sight of the weapon.

"You. Human. Where is your goddess?" Grey Heart's cold, stern voice demanded.

The labourer felt a shiver run down his spine as he stuttered and stammered, unable to speak actual words.

"WHERE. IS. YOUR. GODDESS?!" The god's voice boomed as he aimed his rifle at the labourer's face.

The labourer was overcome be fear so much that he passed out and collapsed to the ground. The commotion had caused a number of people to approach - civilians and military alike.

"We're being invaded! Sound the alarm!" One soldier shouted.

"All civilians take cover!"

"Call Lady Viridian Heart immediately, she needs to know we are under attack!"

"Yes! Call your goddess, bring her to me! She must pay for her crimes of millennia past!" Grey Heart shouted as he opened fire on the soldiers.

The civilians started screaming and running for their lives while the soldiers sought out cover and tried to return fire. Some soldiers never made it to cover as the laser bolts burned through them. Those who did make it and returned fire, saw their efforts look futile as Grey Heart activated a share energy shield to block the incoming attacks. More and more soldiers arrived and were systematically killed or incapacitated by the god. As Grey Heart made his way through the town, a voice called to him from an alleyway.

"My Lord! Viridian Heart is in the Town Hall. Hurry, and you'll catch her before she expects you."

The god stopped and faced the spy, one of many sent here. The spy held up an emblem with a picture of a flame on it - the mark of Firebrand, the top spy in Grey Heart's information network. His reliance on espionage had enabled him to survive and exact revenge on a number of goddesses over the centuries, every one of them having been found by a spy who went by the code name of Firebrand.

"Excellent." A malicious grin grew on Grey Heart's face.

He assumed by now that Viridian Heart was aware of the presence of an enemy at least, and that she would be readying herself for battle. Taking out this goddess would leave Crimson Heart as one of the last few goddess perpetrators of the attempted god genocide still left alive, others having either been slain or simply retired from their positions and lived out the remainder of their lives as humans.

With the location of his target now known, he jumped into the air and flew through the sky to quickly locate the Town Hall, a simple task given how grand it looked with a tall clock tower on one end of it. As he approached, the large doors crashed open and a tall, golden haired woman charged out with a comically huge pike in her hands.

"VENGEANCE HATH COME, VIRIDIAN HEART!" Grey Heart shouted as he summoned his sword and made a beeline for the goddess.

In a few moments, Viridian Heart had activated her HDD mode and she readied herself for the attack.

"Well, 'Lord' Grey Heart. Finally crawled outta hidin' I see. Time to finish off what we started centuries ago! Ruby will be furious when I give 'er your head on my pike!"

The god and goddess clashed. Slashes from Grey Heart were deflected and thrusts from Viridian Heart were dodged. While the two divine beings battled, Grey Heart's army came through the portal, laying siege to all defenders and their fortifications, not hesitating to kill all who stood in their way. The sounds of war echoed through the town with the screams of civilians fleeing for their lives occupying any free time when the sounds of war quietened for brief moments. Some of Viridian Heart's soldiers tried to aid their goddess in attacking the god, only for them to be picked off in quick fashion by Grey Heart's own forces. They did not try to help their god, even though they all wanted to, as they knew they would end up getting in the way and quite probably just hinder him rather than help. - he would call for their aid if he really needed it.

The two CPUs fought for hours, taking their battle into the sky as both tried to gain the upper hand. The reach of Viridian Heart's weapon was an effective line of defence against Grey Heart's sword, whereas her relative slow attack speed allowed Grey Heart to read her every movement and dodge every thrust or cut. The battle on the ground was nearing its conclusion with the attacking army as good as guaranteed victory as there were only a handful of defenders left alive.

"You should just be a good goddess and die! You have no army left to defend your civilians with. There is only you, and you cannot defeat me, Emerald." Grey Heart chuckled evilly as the two CPUs descended to the ground, outside the Town Hall.

"Like hell I will! If I die this day, I'm takin' you with me, you arrogant bastard!"

Viridian Heart lunged forwards and put all the effort she could muster into one immense thrust towards her opponent. Grey Heart sidestepped the attack and brought his sword around to connect with the pike and push it further away from him. In order to not fall over, Viridian Heart had to let her pike go, leaving her unarmed. She growled in frustration as she stepped back quickly to avoid being decapitated as Grey Heart brought his sword round again. The goddess avoided several more attempts at being executed before being forced back against the wooden doors to the Town Hall.

"How fitting, to be slain at your seat of power. I shall at least show you mercy and grant you a swift death, despite all your war crimes!" Grey Heart growled as he raised his sword above his head, ready to strike the goddess down.

He put all his might into the slash to end the goddess, but she slid down onto her backside and rolled to her left to avoid the attack. The sword cut through most of the left door before becoming stuck. Viridian Heart leapt over to her pike and picked it up while Grey Heart was going about freeing his sword. As he was about to pull it free, the goddess struck and thrust her pike into the god's armour. While his share energy took the blow to prevent the weapon piercing through his body, the force was enough to make him lose his grip on his sword and send him crashing through some crates off to the side. Viridian Heart wasted no time in following up her attack, but when she was about to strike again, she was the one struck by a laser bolt which knocked her off balance. Grey Heart swiftly rose to his feet and punched the goddess in the gut and then smacked her with the butt of his rifle.

"Damn you...cheater." Viridian Heart coughed as she landed - more of crashed - next to a house.

"Two weapons are always better than one." Grey Heart grinned.

Both CPUs were starting to get fatigued from their long battle. Ending it soon was of paramount importance as if they kept going for too much longer, they both would be at a stage where even human forces could overwhelm them. This would worry the goddess more than the god, though.

Viridian Heart composed herself and swayed out of the way of a laser bolt aimed at her right shoulder. Another bolt grazed her left arm and a third caught her crown processor unit and sheared a piece off of it. She mustered all her strength and threw her pike at the god. Grey Heart had to dive out of the way to avoid the pike, and he dismissed his laser rifle once he was clear. He got to his feet and ran over to his sword with Viridian Heart in pursuit once she had reclaimed her pike from the stone wall it had lodged itself in. Grey Heart pulled his sword out of the door and sliced through the door completely. He ran inside, followed by the goddess.

"Hey! Get outta there!" She yelled in a panic.

As she ran in, the god swung his sword and she was barely able to deflect in time. The follow up kick to her knee made it buckle and she groaned in pain. She retaliated with a low blow to the god's groin. It was painful to say the least.

"And...you call me..a cheater!" Grey Heart complained as pain coursed through his body.

With another thrust of her pike, she sent the god through the stone wall, who dropped his sword upon impact with the wall. It was only when she looked past him, she realised the mistake she had just made...

Despite the pain and the sound of stones being moved around nosily, the god was aware of the sound of glass breaking directly behind him. Twisting his head, he saw something glowing in a now broken clear mini chamber.

"Emerald's sharicite."

He picked up the broken chamber and started to laugh. He could hear Viridian Heart's feet pounding against the wooden floorboards as she ran over to try and save her sharicite. In one swift and well timed movement, Grey Heart got to his feet, dodged the pike, turned around and slammed the broken chamber into Viridian Heart's chest with all his might. The sharicite chamber pierced straight through and nullified her share energy shield. She could feel the chamber piercing through her very being.

"How does it feel to be slain by your own source of power?" Grey Heart asked as the strength quickly left Viridian Heart.

Her pike dropped to the ground with a clatter and she could feel the warmth around her chest as her own blood started to seep out into the chamber. She couldn't muster up a response, all she could do was feel regret of failing her followers. Within a few more seconds, life ebbed away from her completely as her body went limp. Grey Heart smirked as he pushed her lifeless body to the floor with the sharicite still stuck in her. However, the sharicite itself came into contact with the spilt blood of the goddess and started to react. Grey Heart could feel the pain starting to flow through his body. He looked at the sharicite to see it flicker various colours before it turned a deep red.

"Negative...share energy. Need to get away from here..."

He picked up his sword and started to run as fast as he could out of the Town Hall. He passed a number of his soldiers who called out to him. He had to ignore them in order to get away from the effects of the negative share energy. The humans were not affected, indeed, their belief in the god was sending shares to the sharicite which had now been corrupted and it was producing the negative shares.

After several minutes, he made it back through the portal to his own world, and the effects of the negative share energy dissipated fairly rapidly afterwards. In the end, he had set out what he had wanted - kill a goddess who had been part of the group that had started the genocide of the gods...

* * *

 _Time skip: Present day_

Grey Heart was greeted outside the Command Centre, formerly the Town Hall, by the man effectively in charge of the planet, Captain Mannering, and his second-in-command, Sergeant Willson.

"Ah, my Lord, welcome." He stood at attention before the god and saluted him.

"Captain." Grey Heart returned the salute. "Sergeant."

Sergeant Willson saluted the god, a little bit lazily which Captain Mannering noticed.

"Apologise and salute our Lord properly, Sergeant." He sternly demanded.

"Yes, sir. My apologies, my Lord." Sergeant Willson did as asked.

Grey Heart gave the Sergeant a sympathetic look. Captain Mannering had a reputation as being referred to as a 'Little Dictator', a title unofficially given to him by Grey Heart himself when asked several years ago by General Brodrick on his opinions of the officers and potential successors to warrant promotion to General to replace Brodrick when he either retires or is killed. Suffice to say that being in charge here at Ravenskraigg is about as far as Mannering will get, theoretically. Despite the fact Grey Heart hated goddesses, Mannering's hate for them possibly even surpassed the Grey Heart's own.

"If you will, My Lord, I have the demonstration set up for you to observe." Mannering gestured to the god to follow him.

"Lead on, Captain, I am eager to see what you have to show me." Grey Heart replied, wincing slightly.

The negative share energy was starting to affect him, even though he had only been here a matter of minutes. The pain he felt was akin to having a headache at the moment, but it would eventually turn into a sense of muscular pain and eventually paralysis, eating away at a CPU's energy until death.

Captain Mannering will have noticed the discomfort the god was in. Normally they would have walked to the test area - five minutes away - but given how this world is now volatile for CPUs, they took a car there. Upon arrival, Grey Heart could see Mannering's platoon lined up along with two newly constructed tanks. They were very much different from the _Valiant_ class tanks that had been transported over recently. Bigger, one rather large barrels and six treads compared to the two on the _Valiant_ tanks.

"Platoon...ATTENNNNNNNNTION!" Mannering shouted as the trio arrived.

Everyone was in perfect sync, except one soldier down the far end.

"STAND AAAAAAT. EASE!"

Again, the same soldier was a step behind the others.

"It's nice to see some things never change. Lance Corporal Joanes still unable to follow orders in time." Grey Heart grinned.

"Sorry, sir. It takes time for the sound to get down to me here, you see, my Lord, and in that time everyone else has heard it and acted."

Grey Heart chuckled at the elderly Lance Corporal's excuse for why he is always off the beat with drill orders.

"How many years have you tried to get him to follow them perfectly in time, Captain?"

"Too long, my Lord. Sergeant! Start the demonstration."

"Yes, sir. Now come along chaps, if you wouldn't awfully mind just standing over there to one side." Willson politely gestured to the platoon, which caused Mannering to groan.

The platoon broke into murmurs as they did as requested of them. With the soldiers out of the way, Willson unclipped a walkie-talkie from his belt and handed it to Captain Mannering. Mannering turned it on and switched it to the frequency the tank crew were on.

" _Paladin_ One and Two, move out and proceed with demonstration." Mannering ordered.

There was a static infused affirmative in response as both tanks rolled forwards.

"As you can see, my Lord, the tanks are much larger than the _Valiant_ tanks we have been producing. While they are not as fast as their predecessor, they are significantly better armoured and, thanks to the six treads they have, have a degree of flexibility over rough terrain. They also have better weight distribution which won't hinder them when moving over weight limited terrain and the like."

The tanks stopped in front of some old and decrepit vehicles; relics from the past that had been long stripped of any salvageable parts.

"Open fire on the targets!" Mannering shouted into the walkie-talkie.

The turrets on the tanks turned towards the targets and fired off several rounds. They made short work of the targets, much to Mannering's delight.

"The _Paladins_ have a much quicker reload time than the _Valiants_ , thanks so the width of the barrel which allows for multiple shells to be loaded at once. The downside to this is they have a shorter range, plus in a single shot the _Valiants_ will still do a greater amount of damage, but overall the _Paladins_ will have a higher damage-per-second average than the _Valiants_." Mannering explained.

"This is looking promising, Captain." Grey Heart nodded in approval.

"Move to location 'B' and set up for assault." Mannering ordered into the walkie-talkie.

" _Yes, sir._ " The crackled affirmative could be heard through the receiver.

Grey Heart raised an eyebrow as he watched the tanks roll in the direction of a relative steep hill about half a mile away. They stopped well short of their attack range and Grey Heart gave the Captain a questioning look. Sergeant Willson realised what the tanks were going to do.

"Do you think that's wise?" He asked Mannering.

"Of course it is! We may finally find out if there are any metals worth mining in there as well. A low risk and high reward situation." Mannering replied, dismissing Willson's concerns.

Grey Heart was still curious when the tanks changed. Large stabilisers came out of the sides, front and rear of the tanks and thumped onto the ground. The gun barrel on the tanks retracted and out the other side a much longer and wider barrel extended.

"Inspired by your ability to transform into a much more powerful being, my Lord. The real strength of the _Paladin_ lies in its own ability to transform and enter an assault mode. While the tank is completely immobile, it has an attack range far greater than anything we've ever made or seen before, perhaps maybe you have witnessed something better in your life, sir, but to our generation of humans we haven't. In addition to the range, it has an even greater damage output than in tank mode. You will be also interested to know that the shells they use are tipped with a small amount of concentrated negative share energy, which will make them extremely effective against the goddesses." Mannering looked giddy with excitement. "FIRE!"

Grey Heart found this last fact to be very enticing. Having a weapon like this would improve his human forces chances against the goddesses when they will go up against them.

Two loud firing sounds echoed through the landscape as the tanks opened fire on the hillside. Grey Heart could see large amounts of terrain being displaced by the explosions. The tanks had a rather lengthy reload time, but he had to admit there was no current land based human force that he knew of that would be able to stand up to these shells.

"Of course, my Lord, these tanks are intended for attack, but they do seem to be surprisingly potent in defence when used in this mode." Mannering stated proudly. "Cease fire. The demonstration is over. Return to the hanger for refuelling and rearming."

"I must admit, Captain, I was wondering what you had up your sleeve when you requested my presence, but I am very impressed with your work here. I give my approval for the construction of these new tanks alongside our _Valiants_." Grey Heart gave the Captain an encouraging smile and a firm handshake.

"Thank you, my Lord. I am glad you are pleased with the tanks."

"Are those two tanks ready to enter service straight away?" The god asked.

"Once they have been refuelled and rearmed, yes, my Lord. Though, if I may, I have something I'd like to discuss with you in my office, if you can spare the time." Mannering asked.

"I suppose I can, I'd like to take those tanks with me back to Gamindustri."

A few minutes later, Captain Mannering and Grey Heart were in Mannering's office. The god sat down opposite the Captain, feeling the effects of the negative share energy more now.

"My Lord, I have overheard some of my soldiers talking to the drivers of the trains about various things, including the fact that you currently have a _goddess_ imprisoned on Gamindustri. I must pro-"

Grey Heart held a hand up, silencing the Captain.

"Word does travel quick these days." Grey Heart sighed. "Yes, Captain, I DO have a goddess held captive, and believe me, I would have liked to have killed her before she becomes a threat, but I have had Firebrand spend the last four years advising me spare them rather than kill them. Whilst I am certainly have no intention of making friends with them, I am in a position where Firebrand and my network of spies have intricate knowledge of them and thus I would be downright stupid to ignore their reports. I already asked Green Heart, the goddess, to give up her powers in exchange for guaranteeing her life and a position of political power. She flat out refused."

Mannering grunted. He was NOT happy in the slightest that Grey Heart had no apparent plans to kill his captive goddess and it showed on his face.

"My Lord, you know better than I do just how untrustworthy and dangerous goddesses are! Slaying them is the best thing for us!"

"NO!" Grey Heart slammed his hands down on Mannering's desk and shouted in the Captain's face. "Need I remind you that **I** am in charge, Captain?! I will act as I see fit to lead my followers and I will consider all possibilities! If the goddess needs to be eradicated, I will do so! You WILL follow my orders and NOT question my decisions or I shall strip you of your rank and send you to work on the fishing boats in Haven!"

Grey Heart stood up and left. He did not want to hear the response from the Captain and gave him no opportunity to reply. He was confused. Why exactly did he feel the need to justify himself when asked about Vert? Why did he get so angry over Mannering suggesting she be killed? He wasn't certain of the answer, but perhaps it was the negative share energy affecting him. Yes, it had to be...

* * *

Half an hour later, the portal was opened back to Gamindustri and Grey Heart returned to his new home, with both _Paladin_ tanks following him. The tanks caused quite a stir when soldiers and workers saw them roll through the portal after the god.

"I assume this is what the Little Dictator was so excited about?" Brodrick asked the god.

"Indeed, General. These new tanks, though still untested in actual war, could very well be a key component in defeating Crimson Heart once and for all. While they won't really be of help against that blasted flying fortress of hers, they will be against her directly." Grey Heart wore a confident smile.

"How exactly, my Lord?"

"I'll give Mannering his dues; they've been able to fill the tips of the shells the tanks use with a concentrated form of negative share energy. I think our first true test of how good these tanks are will be when the other goddesses here inevitably come to rescue Vert. I'm looking forward to spoiling their plans."

To Be Continued...


	8. Chapter 7

Chapter 7: She Who Has No Physical Form

Neptune had done her best to put off going to LAN Castle or trying to find someone to go in her place. The simple fact was, though, Histoire's command was final. Neptune was going to LAN Castle to pay a visit to Uranus whether she liked it or not! Hint: It was the latter of the two.

Neptune had spent the entire time moaning and complaining about having to do this, so much so that she hadn't even transformed to fly there to make her arduous task go by much quicker. No, the complaining was far more important to her at this moment and with the weather as poor as it was too, it just felt quite fitting to Neptune to have to endure this. Though, when she eventually reached LAN Castle, the old ruins where Uranus resided looked quite accurate in this scene in her mind.

"Yeah, creepy old castle ruins with a background sky full of foul weather. Paint a picture of it and everyone will say how accurate it comes across as." Neptune shook her head and sighed as she trudged through the overgrown fauna towards the castle entrance.

Each step was just making her wetter and wetter, but onwards she kept going, if only to spite Histoire by doing her work for once.

"Soakingly wet, relentless, energy sapping, boredom inducing - I do know some big words, y'know - hair ruining, clothe drenching rain. Man, thank goodness this is a story or all the fans would be getting a CG of me with see-through clothes right now. So all you pervs out there, you'll just have to imagine it if you're THAT desperate to see my undies."

Neptune had made it to the castle and to some cover. She started to wring the water out of her hair, a large puddle forming next to her.

"Good thing I'm a goddess or I'd likely catch a cold out in this. Last thing I need is Compa 'bandaging' me again..." Neptune grimaced at the memory.

The last time Neptune needed bandaging, Compa tightened them so much so they 'wouldn't come off', Neptune was convinced she was literally going to be healed to death.

Neptune summoned her tachi blade and opened one of the large, rotting wooden doors into the dungeon entrance of LAN Castle. This place was still inhabited by monsters, who seemed to take care in trying to not expedite the demise of the decaying ruins. Neptune did wonder how all the candles never ran out of wax here. Magic? Did the monsters go out of their way to steal candles to replace burnt out ones? Maybe somewhere deep within the castle there was an enormous stock of them? Or is everyone just not supposed to think about this?

Neptune readied herself for combat as she chose the option of blindly running in with all guns (1 tachi sword and whatever verbal assault she chose) blazing. Normally one would choose a tactful, carefully planned out way of dealing with groups of monsters when in a party of one, but this being Neptune, any sort of difficult thinking was just disregarded by her.

"The Protag is here! Watch out 'cause I'm gonna Nep you allllll up!"

Needless to say, her shouting removed whatever tactical advantage she would have had on the first group of monsters wandering about the ruins, and a number others will have been alerted to the presence of an intruder.

"Hyyeaaahhh!" Neptune cried out as she swung her tachi like crazy at the monsters before her.

The Deadly Spiders scurried around to avoid Neptune's attacks by any means, but Neptune was able to better their speed and dispatched a couple of them quickly.

"Man, come on! This is gonna be a real bore getting through these." The goddess moaned.

In that moment, several ghosts materialised and began attacking Neptune from behind. The number of attacks meant she ended up flat on her face, with there being no sign of the assault being stopped any time soon.

"Come on! That's cheating! Most of the games are turn-based and all of them have mini-maps so we can see anything approaching from behind! Where was my mini-map when I needed it!?" Neptune complained. "No fair! If you keep this up, you'll make me angry!"

Neptune tried to stop the attacks with several clumsy swings of her blade, but each one failed to have any effect on her predicament. There was only one way for Neptune to save herself...

The blinding flash of light engulfed Neptune and was able to stop the monsters from attacking her as they all shirked away to try and not be blinded.

"I warned you. Now I am angry, and I shall not show any mercy!" Purple Heart threatened the monsters as she glared at them, thrusting her blade out before her.

The Guardian CPU wasted no time in slashing down her foes, each one dissipating into fragments of energy that dissolved into nothingness. Several more monsters arrived only to be cut down in seconds by the hand of the angry goddess. Purple Heart pressed forwards and swiftly made her way to the end of the dungeon. The place they encountered Uranus before.

"Uranus! The goddess of Planeptune seeks your counsel! Please grant me an audience with yourself." Purple Heart asked loudly, hoping to raise the ethereal former goddess from her eternal slumber.

"Ah, so, thou hath returned once more, mine successor. Giveth the world hath not endeth, thine younger sibling was successful in slaying the Deity of Sin, and hath succeeded where mine generation failed?" Uranus's voice echoed through the room.

Purple Heart allowed herself a few seconds to decipher what Uranus was saying to her, given her archaic way of speaking. _***Believe me, as the author, I have spent quite a long time trying to make sure that Uranus has a more archaic way of speaking than she did have in Re;Birth2, and that it is, hopefully, accurate.***_

"Indeed. Our desires were strong enough to counter the threat of the Deity of Sin, and, thanks to Nepgear being the catalyst in securing our return and bringing all of us together again, we were able to finally bring an end to the Deity of Sin." Purple Heart told the former goddess, her voice full of pride for her sister.

"Why hast thou awoken me from mine slumber once again?"

"A new threat now faces us. One we have never encountered before; a man who wields the power of goddesses, claiming he is a god - a male equivalent of us. He has undeniable strength and has managed to capture Vert. Histoire has requested your guidance on how we may deal with this new threat to our world." Purple Heart explained the situation to the ethereal former goddess.

"Yet one more threat doth our world face?" Uranus sighed loudly with no attempt to cover up the weariness in it. "Gamindustri must be a cursed world, successor. Mine mind is stressed already..."

"Will you join us and give guidance against our new foe?"

"I am uncertain, successor, what aid I could giveth to thine comrades? Thou remembereth that mine fellow goddesses had a tenuous relationship."

Purple Heart actually knew very little about Uranus's time as CPU of Planeptune other than what she had more or less told her and the other goddesses the first time they sought her out.

"What aid you could give is better than none at all. This is a complete unknown and none of us will know how to proceed. Your experience at CPU of our nation will, at the very least, give us a different viewpoint on whatever plans we come up with."

There was silence for a while. Purple Heart wondered if somewhere in her explanation that Uranus had got bored and left without hearing her out.

"I cannot aid you, goddess of Planeptune. Thy quandary hath nothing to do with mineself, nor do I possesseth knowledge of such a being. Remember that mine fellow guardians and I were not able to defeateth the Deity of Sin; they now are but memoires in mine mind and I possesseth no physical form. Thine journey was a wasted one, successor. Go forth back to our nation and seek aid from thine kin. The past cannot help thou no more. Giveth my regards to Histoire and thine sister." Uranus replied to Purple Heart. "Allow me to resume mine eternal slumber."

Purple Heart sighed in frustration at Uranus's lack of desire to help.

"Do you not care about the nation you were once the goddess of? Do you not believe that you still have a duty to protect the land you once called 'home'? Just because you have no physical form, you are -were- the goddess of Planeptune. I am sorely tempted to suggest you are simply making an excuse to not help out." Purple Heart thrust an index finger in front of her to emphasise her point, even though she had no clue as to where Uranus was actually in relation to where she was standing.

"Thou is the Guardian CPU of Planeptune. **I** am not. Mine time as goddess hath come and gone. Please remove thy presence from this castle, CPU, lest thou anger me further."

Purple Heart narrowed her eyes and shook her head slowly.

"Very well, Uranus. I hope, for your sake, we do not need your assistance."

With that, the goddess turned and left, each noisy footstep echoing through the halls until silence fell in the room once more.

For Uranus, things had changed a while ago. She had been effectively locked up in LAN Castle ever since she lost her physical form and was unable to leave. With the Deity of Sin gone, whatever force was keeping her here had dissipated and the former goddess was free to roam about once again. This new turn of events had piqued her interest, especially given what Purple Heart had told her about their enemy. Uranus had never had a worthwhile reason to leave her confines, but now there was one.

"Perhaps I shall payeth this...god...a visit." Uranus smirked as she passed through the stone walls and exited the castle remains. "One must payeth a visit to Planeptune first to find out where mine new target of interest resides."

Uranus passed Purple Heart, who looked thoroughly annoyed with the events that had taken place. The former goddess did feel a pang of regret in what was left of her soul. Refusing to help the nation she had once protected for a long time wasn't something she took any enjoyment or pride in.

 _'Apologies, successor. I have wasted thine time, but I shall help thou at some point.'_

* * *

 _Planeptune: one hour later_

Uranus had reached her former home in only a few minutes. Seeing the city now as to what it was like during her time made her feel relieved that it was progressing well, despite the best efforts of the Deity of Sin and various other events that Uranus had no knowledge of at the time. The ethereal goddess had infiltrated the Basilicom to find out what she wanted to know but to no avail since she has no physical form in order to access the archived data and such. Still, she has _other_ ways obtaining the information: her current form allows her to invade the mind of an unsuspecting being and look through their memoires. The Basilicom staff weren't much help since they haven't been around during the meetings that had taken place between the CPUs and what little sights they had of the goddesses held no interactions apart from greetings and farewells.

 _'I wonder if mine old friend, Histoire, can be so easily accessed...'_

Uranus sought out Histoire in her usual place in the Basilicom, fussing over the current events taking place and processing reports. A sight quite familiar to when Uranus was the goddess leading Planeptune. Uranus had an old image resurface from her memory in seeing Histoire in the exact same pose so many decades ago. It made her feel quite sad and she found herself longing for the days when she had a body of her own.

Reminiscing about the past was not why Uranus was here, though. She glided over to her former Oracle and began to search through Histoire's memories. It certainly didn't take long to find something useful, and Uranus paid close attention to the maps that Histoire had added information to regarding their new opponent. There was little else on the so called 'god' that Purple Heart hadn't already told her, but with neither Neptune nor Noire around at the moment, Uranus couldn't try and siphon the information off of them. Still, she had knowledge of where to go now and that was enough for her for now.

 _'The Leanbox goddess is captured, I believe. Mayhap her memories will giveth more?'_ Uranus pondered as she released herself from Histoire's mind.

The ethereal former goddess left with a destination in hand, leaving Histoire alone.

"Goodness! I appear to have let my mind wander." Histoire stated in shock to herself as she blinked a few times and shook her head. "Thank the goddesses that Neptune isn't here, otherwise she would have a field day about this, that I am sure of."

As Histoire resumed her work, she couldn't shake off the feeling that something _unnatural_ had just happened to her...

* * *

 _Grey Heart's base of operations: two hours later_

Even here, the relentless rain thundered down with no sign of stopping. Uranus had watched various groups of soldiers out on patrol, every one of them complaining about the dreadful conditions and exactly _why_ they had to go out on patrol.

 _'Humans can be so annoying, sometimes.'_ Uranus sighed in her mind after she had got bored of the complaints.

Uranus invaded the minds of a few of the stationary guards and quickly found where Vert was, along with the other Neptune. Uranus' curiosity was piqued by the human version of her successor. Only to be rather disappointed by what she saw...

"C'mon! Surely someone will play a game with me? I know _His gracious Lordship_ gave me a few extra packs of cards so I could play Spider Solitaire, but seriously, I've played that game so many times now that I can tell from the deal if I'm gonna win or not! I'm dyin' of boredom here! Miss Busty won't play with me so one of you guard type fellows should! Please!" Neptune shouted with her arms flailing out of her jail cell.

The response from the guards was that they simply closed the door into the cells and locked it.

"Aw, seriously?! What's a girl gotta do to get some attention around here?"

"Please, Neptune, keep your voice down! I'm tired of listening to you go on about how bored you are! I'm bored, too! I haven't been able to log on to any of my online games in what feels like weeks now, but do you hear me shouting my head off about it? No!" Vert snapped at Neptune.

"Whoa! Chill out, Miss Busty! You're gonna get wrinkles all over your face if you keep scowling at me like that."

"Heavens, no! My perfect skin cannot develop such signs of aging already! A goddess cannot age beyond her set physical age...but I don't have access to my share energy...so...am I aging like a mere _human_?!" Vert went into a panic.

If Uranus still had a hand and a face, she would have slapped her hand over her face and unleashed the most frustrated sigh ever heard. Given that she was currently spying, however, she had to do with leaving immediately before her sanity crumbled away.

 _'How I fear of mine planet. This generation of goddesses are...unique. Oh, Mars, Jupiter and Mercury, how I misseth you three now. I shouldeth tried to befriend you all more...'_

Uranus wallowed in her depression over her lost comrades, something she had never done before. Sure, she had felt a bit of regret when they had perished while she only lost her physical form, but she had never missed them until now.

 _'I can think in mine mind later, now I haveth to meet this god.'_

* * *

Grey Heart was busy reading over various notes, reports, letters and requests sent from Haven, Ravenskraigg and here on Gamindustri. They ranged from reports from various spies in the four nations to requests for leave, maintenance reports and so on. Really, he was just reading over what General Brodrick and Major Mason had done with the requests, all he had to do was authorise the acceptances of denials in them, unless he wanted to pull rank on them.

He was disappointed to see that a report from Captain Mannering regarding the construction of the new Oil Refinery on Ravenskraigg was going to take significantly longer than planned due to poor quality resources mined recently which has hampering steel production. This in turn would lead to a problem for maintenance on Gamindustri, with the diesel fuel reserves getting low, which meant that what was left of the locomotive fleet would end up having to be cut back to avoid double headed movements initially and then eventually cut back further until more fuel could be refined. Brodrick had put a reply forward to have all type 3 power band locomotives immediately stored and their tanks drained so the type 4 and type 5 power band locomotives could go longer and avoid double heading, with all type 4s to be slowly stored once their fuel levels drop below a quarter, with the remaining fuel drained to keep the type 5s working longer.

Finally, there was a letter from Haven which came with a wax seal on it. It was a very archaic way of sending important messages, but one Grey Heart kept as it meant it was a request of great importance and it was directly for him to reply to - Brodrick nor Mason had seen it. The god hadn't received a message like this for several decades so he did feel a sense of excitement in the anticipation on what it could be about. Breaking the seal, opening the envelope and removing the letter, he opened it out to see it was from his lead scientist on Haven.

"What could it be that is so important?" Grey Heart said out loud as he started to read the letter.

 _Lord Grey Heart,_

 _As you know, I've never been one for beating about the bush, so I'll stick with my 'type' and get straight to the point._

 _I have been working hard on developing cures for illnesses, stimulants and such to ensure that, primarily, the soldiers are always (nearly) ready for service at a moment's notice and any illnesses are overcome far quicker than by letting nature take its own course. Now, I have been extending that to our workers as well, since without them the army would quickly fall to no food or equipment._

 _In the last 24 hours, I have found out that you are currently in 'possession', as it were, of a goddess. While I detest the idea that you would have any involvement with those harpies, I am smart enough to look beyond my prejudices and see that there is an opportunity to be grasped here._

 _In order to expedite my research, I ask the difficult task of you to consider im-_

"WHAT?!" Grey Heart shouted loudly. "He wants me to WHAT to her?!"

The god slammed the letter down on his work desk, picked up one of the ink markers and slammed a 'DENIED' mark across the letter.

"For goodness sake! What the hell is going on with people now? You capture ONE goddess and suddenly all hell breaks loose within your own ranks! Do I plan to have a romantic involvement with the goddess? Am I going to seduce her? Marry her? Heck, now I have a damn request to get her PREGNANT! I have NOT spent centuries fighting and killing goddesses just for this sorry turn of events to happen to me!" Grey Heart slammed a fist down on his desk. "Why on earth did I listen to Firebrand again? It certainly wasn't for THIS to happen!"

For the next few minutes Grey Heart stormed around his quarters, gesticulating and furiously complaining.

"Heh, I almost feel sorrow for thou, god." A voice called out.

Grey Heart froze on the spot. In an instant he was turning round and scanning his quarters with his sword in hand, trying to find who was there.

"Show yourself!" He shouted. _'I never even sensed anything.'_

"Oh, dear god, thou cannot see mine self. I standeth before thou, but I am merely one shadow of mine former self." The voice explained, from much closer. "I lack a physical form, thus I am unable to engage in hostilities with thou."

"What...are you, then? And why are you here?" The god queried. "If you were an assassin, you most certainly have missed your opportunity."

"Why, I am the former goddess of Planeptune. My name is Uranus, and I have come here to see, with my own eyes, what my successor is facing."

"So, you are a spy then?"

"Hmph. No, I am not. I told my successor that I cannot aid her with her troubles any more. I have spent many, many decades trapped within the confines of a castle ruins, but now I am free. I have never heard of your kind before and I got curious as to what you are."

"I guess that means I cannot forcibly remove you from here, nor ensure you cannot come back?"

"Heh, indeed, god. You are stuck with me for as long as I choose. Do not be too alarmed, though, I shall give you privacy when you need it, nor shall I divulge any secrets to my fellow goddesses. I wish to see how this fight amongst you will play out. I have been without entertainment for more years than I care to remember."

Grey Heart grunted as his expression hardened. He didn't like the idea that this spiritual former goddess was viewing the inevitable upcoming confrontation with the goddesses as some kind of sport.

"Your speech has changed. I no longer hear your archaic dialect, why is that?" Grey Heart asked, changing the conversation in a different direction.

"Mine speech can change when I choose. Just because I learned to speak with an ancient dialect does not mean I didn't move with the times when the language was modernised. Plus, I always spoke with a more archaic dialect when the other goddesses chose to seek me out as it was more fun watching them try to decipher what I was saying. You have no trouble with that, I notice."

"I am far older than you are. I first spoke with the most ancient of dialects, but always moved forwards with my followers in terms of speech to arrive with what we use nowadays."

"Makes sense, I suppose. Now, tell me, god, what was that letter that you were throwing such expletives at while flailing your arms around?"

"That..." Grey Heart cleared his throat and turned his head to one side. "Is none of your business."

"Oh? Then what was all the talk about impregnating the Leanbox goddess and marrying her?" Uranus teased the god.

Again, he cleared his throat, feeling rather uncomfortable with where this conversation was going.

"I have no plans of doing such a thing to her."

"Marrying her or having her bear your children?"

"BOTH!" Grey Heart snapped.

"My, touchy aren't we?"

"I have NO intentions of defiling a goddess. Even if she **were** to give her consent, which I highly doubt she would, I would still refuse! I may despise goddesses, but I still have some elements of morality left within me!"

As Uranus was about to respond, there was a knock on the door into Grey Heart's quarters.

"Yes?" Grey Heart asked, raising his voice.

"Brodrick, my Lord. Permission to enter." The General asked.

"Erm...y-yes, General. Come in."

Grey Heart wasn't certain about letting his General in with his current...visitor...present, but since he couldn't see her, he doubted Brodrick would be able to. Grey Heart did wonder just how much Brodrick heard of his argument with Uranus. He suddenly felt rather nervous, something that hadn't happened for more years than the old god cared to remember.

The General opened the door and walked in, closing the door behind him. He faced the god and saluted him, keeping the pose until the god saluted him back.

 _'My, what a well trained servant.'_ Uranus mused.

"What is it, General?" The god asked.

"My Lord, new information has been reported that the Leanbox army is moving out tonight to launch an attempt to rescue their goddess. It is believed that over ninety percent of their army will be coming here. Shall I upload orders to _Epsilon_ to launch a counter against all military forces and associated buildings while they are busy here?"

The god ran a hand along his chin and thought for a few moments, forgetting about Uranus for now.

"No, General. While I would very much like to take advantage of Leanbox's lack of defences, I will have _Epsilon_ and the Armoured Division accompany me to meet their army before they find us. From what I know, no...living being knows our exact position, just a general area. I will ambush their forces myself, and with armoured and aerial support, the Leanbox army will be defeated swiftly."

The General thought for a few moments, weighing up the pros and cons to Grey Heart's plan. He frowned and rubbed his chin in a thoughtful manner before replying.

"Very well, My Lord, I shall relay orders to Major Mason to prep the tank crews for live fire night-time combat. I will relay any new and relevant information back to you via _Epsilion_ if you are not present when it comes in."

"Thank you, General. You are dismissed."

With another round of salutes, the General excused himself and left, shutting the door behind him.

"Mmm, that is one fine specimen of what Humans can be like. I commend you on training him well."

"General Brodrick is the finest soldier in my armed forces. I have not 'trained' him as you put it. I put my complete trust in his abilities and I rely on him to ensure that what moves I make here are the correct ones. He has been on this world longer than I have and is more familiar with it."

"Thou dost defer to thine underling? An interesting notion, god. Mine will was always absolute in mine time. Perhaps..." Uranus trailed off as the vague memories of her era surfaced.

Grey Heart said nothing as he walked over to the desk, picked up the letter he had stamped 'DENIED' on, folded it up and proceeded to leave his quarters, locking the door behind him with a key he kept on him.

"Where art thou going?" Uranus asked.

"To post my reply back to my good doctor. I need an envelope from a warehouse of general goods and then I will hand it to someone at the locomotive depot for it to be sent back. It is rather mundane, far too boring for someone like you."

If Uranus still had eyes, she would have rolled them. Instead she just sighed and continued to follow the god.

 _'There is still a battle coming tonight. It will be interesting to see just how strong he is and how much he will hold back against humans. I might well end up getting the entertainment I want.'_

To Be Continued...

* * *

Note: I should just mention that I made up Mars, Jupiter and Mercury as the other goddesses of Uranus' time, since they are just nameless goddesses in the lore.

Mars would have been the goddess of Lastation, Jupiter the goddess of Leanbox and Mercury the goddess of Lowee.


	9. Chapter 8

Chapter 8: Rescuing Vert

Day had given way to night on the far south coast of Gamindustri's Pangaea continent. What was left of the native wildlife, that which would not eat humans, had entered their slumber for the night. As for the people of the base here, that was something different. Tanks rolled out of the base, heading east along the coastline with the naval vessel heading the same way. In the air a lone figure flew past the armour column on a direct heading.

The Leanbox army had mobilised and was en route to Vert's last known location in an effort to rescue their goddess from her concrete prison and from the clutches of her male captor - woe betide anyone who so much as laid a finger in any sort of defiling way on Vert in the eyes of Chika and the men in the army.

The army had taken several transports west to the mainland, where they proceeded on foot through the vast woodlands, hoping to use the cover of the trees to avoid being detected for as long as possible. Along the way, several soldiers mentioned the complete lack of monsters in the woods, despite this area being known for housing various nests and a few powerful dragons. Chika did not take any notice of the chat, while some other soldiers started to say that perhaps going without the other goddesses wasn't a good idea. Chika merely ordered them onwards to rescue Vert...

* * *

 _Planeptune: Evening_

"Kei, Mina." Histoire sighed. "I fear Chika has foolishly gone to rescue Vert."

 _"Oh my. She's such a spoiled brat sometimes, I have no idea why Lady Vert puts up with her antics."_ Mina groaned.

 _"Well this isn't something we should be surprised at, is it? She craves the attention of Vert all the time and she acts so immature when she doesn't get her own way. Don't get me started on how emotion based her decisions are either, I wonder a lot how Leanbox's economy hasn't imploded given the lack of business models those two have."_ Kei complained.

"Yes, well, I don't think bad mouthing Chika is going to help us here. The point is I'm worried about her rushing off without us having a viable plan to rescue Vert. We know very little about this 'god' and even less about his followers. I tried to contact Chika in Leanbox but the staff told me she had taken a sizeable army off to the mainland for 'special training'. When I asked for clarification, they couldn't tell me as they didn't know themselves. I'm guessing that Chika has kept Vert's capture secret."

 _"I can see the positives in that move."_ Kei nodded her head appreciatively of Chika's decision.

"However, I have tried to contact Chika directly and I cannot get a signal through to her. Given what intel we have, it seems they have some kind of signal jammer active. I am loathe to send the goddesses in, but I fear I may have to." Histoire worried.

 _"I can understand that, Histoire, but I don't see any other alternatives. I would not like the Candidates to go, given the inexperience they still have. Nepgear might be able to handle herself but Rom and Ram will end up causing trouble."_ Mina shook her head with a touch of annoyance on her face.

 _"I'm not certain Uni would be able to make a logical decision, given how much she takes after Noire in her reactions to mild provocation. I would have doubts over about sending Noire too, but given that she is reliable and she knows what she could be up against tell me otherwise. I will say that any action taken must involve all the goddesses going as a group."_ Kei told her colleagues.

 _"I agree with Kei. The CPU Candidates should not be exposed to an unknown danger. We'll send Noire and Blanc back to Planeptune tomorrow to join Neptune and Uzume. The four of them should be enough to rescue Vert."_ Mina concluded. _"Shall we take our leave?"_

"Very well. I can't shake the feeling that Chika is setting herself up for a fall, but there is little we can do about it now. Goodnight you two." Histoire shut the communications down with a worried look on her face.

"You know that Chika is screwed, right?" IF asked.

IF had been standing to the side, waiting for Histoire to finish her conversation with the other Oracles.

"A more eloquent term would be better, but yes." Histoire sighed. "I can only hope she realises her error in time."

"Are you gonna send Nep and Gear out to stop her?"

"They are already on their way, though I fear they won't be able to find her in time if that jammer is still active. Are you certain this god knows an attack is about to happen?"

"Yeah. A few of my guys in Leanbox heard a strange code being transmitted. When they traced the origin, it was from a transmitter aimed in the direction of their base. Doesn't take a genius to put two and two together, especially since the message was transmitted within one hour of Chika giving the order for the Leanbox army to move out." IF explained.

"So he has spies in Leanbox then?"

"Wouldn't surprise me if he has spies in all the nations. I'd be shocked if he didn't, considering they just HAVE to have been on Gamindustri for years without us somehow knowing." IF walked over to one of the windows and looked outside into the night sky. "Makes me wonder just how much info over the years has been doctored and to what extent? Just who can we trust? Who is a spy and who isn't? Hell, they've probably been here way longer than I've been alive."

 _'I'm not going to get any sleep tonight, am I?'_ Histoire thought as her worried look became more profound.

* * *

Everything was set for the battle: The enemy was completely unaware, the tanks were positioned out of sight and _Epsilon_ was ready, scanning enemy movements and relaying them via a radar feed directly linked to Grey Heart's communication device. They were close. Very close.

"Be ready, Major. Contact within the next ninety seconds. Wait for my attack command." Grey Heart whispered into the device.

 _"Acknowledged, my Lord."_

The wooded areas contained many types of trees, with the god hidden from view by one particularly large redwood tree. It didn't take long for foreign voices to enter earshot.

"Why is there a track through here anyway? Shouldn't all of this be a forest or something?"

"Yeah, I still can't believe we haven't seen a monster yet. Hell, we haven't even seen a _dead_ monster. Hell, I'd take seeing a dogoo right now! I really don't like this. Feels like we're walking into a trap."

 _'How perceptive of you. It's about to get a whole lot worse.'_ Grey Heart thought as his mouth formed an evil smirk.

"Shut up! We are going to rescue my darling sister. YOUR goddess!" Chika snapped as she glared at the soldiers behind her.

"She still views herself as Lady Vert's sister." One soldier whispered.

"I don't know how Lady Vert puts up with it, really." Another replied.

As Chika was about to pass the redwood, a sword swung out from the tree and stopped millimetres from her face. She screamed and fell backwards, landing on the hard ground.

"ALL FORCES - ATTACK!" Grey Heart shouted into his communications device.

ORDER ACKNOWLEDGED - LAUNCHING MANTAS - ENEMY BIOLOGICAL TARGETS TAGGED

 _"Valiants, roll out! Fire at will! Units five through eight, target the trees to create a line of sight for the Mantas strafing runs!"_

Grey Heart stepped out from behind the tree and kneed Chika in the face. She yelped from the blow and cried out in pain again when the back of her head hit the ground. She felt very dizzy and her vision was blurry - she was in no position to fight at the moment. The god, on the other hand, charged at the soldiers while they were still dumbfounded. He swung his sword around, cutting down soldiers where they stood.

"Shit! We're under attack!"

"Open fire! Protect Chika!"

"Who the hell is this guy?!"

The armed forces opened fire on the god. Bullets pinged off the share energy surrounding him as they tried to overpower him with sheer numbers. Grey Heart leapt into the sky and changed his weapon, firing off laser bolts which felled soldiers with ease.

"Share energy?! What the hell?!"

"Armor isn't protecting anything!"

The growling of huge engines and clanking of metal filled the area as the tanks appeared, raining shells down upon their targets.

"Holy crap! TANKS!"

"Use the grenades! Blow them up! Bullets ain't gonna do sh-"

"They're blowing up trees? What lame shots!"

"What is the roaring in the distance?"

"Keep firing! Focus on the tanks!"

"They've got air support! We're done for!"

" _Epsilon_ \- new order update: tag enemy biological target 'Chika Hakozaki' as neutral and NOT to be killed." Grey Heart ordered.

ORDER RECEIVED: UPDATING MISSION DATA - MISSION DATA UPLOAD SUCCESSFUL

The four Mantas, utilising their thermal imaging cameras, started strafing runs on the Leanbox forces. The whole battle was turning into a massacre with soldiers being slain left, right and centre in various ways.

Chika winced as she touched the back of her head. There was going to be one big bruise there over the next few days, if she survived this battle. She was vulnerable to attack, yet the enemy was ignoring her completely, only focusing on the soldiers.

"My army..." Chika whispered as realisation hit her, the impact blows she had received had left her with an addled mind temporarily.

She could see bodies of the fallen everywhere - all of them Leanbox soldiers. She wondered how long she had been out for. Had she even lost consciousness? The sounds of war brought what has functioning of her brain back to where she was. Chika looked to her right to see a wall of tanks relentlessly firing shells, above were jet planes unleashing volleys of laser bolts, and moving around picking off soldiers one by one was a being not unlike the goddesses, save for the fact this being was a man and not a woman. The mere thought that Vert could be defeated by a **man** like this both enraged Chika and terrified her at the same time.

But, what would Vert say to her if - when - she finds out that a large portion of her armed forces has been killed in combat? Not to mention Chika not collaborating with her fellow Oracles and devising a strategy to rescue Vert and running off on a whim fuelled by emotion. It didn't look good for Chika at all. She looked on as shells exploded and bolts of energy cut through soldiers like a proverbial hot knife.

"STOP! STOP THIS BATTLE! NOW!" Chika cried out as she gingerly made it back to her feet.

Nothing happened for several seconds to indicate that Chika's cries had been heard, let alone had any effect. This battle was a lost cause and she had to find some way to stop it before all that was left was her. Parlaying with the god was the only real chance she would have.

"Please stop! I...surrender." The words came out through gritted teeth.

Despite the lack of volume from her voice compared to her first attempt, the god took notice of her. His gaze made Chika feel a level of fear she didn't know existed inside her, a shiver ran down her spine and all her nerves tingled along her arms and at the back of her neck.

"All forces, hold fire." The god spoke into his communicator.

The sounds of war died down as the tanks held their position and the jets circled in the sky, all awaiting further orders.

"Stand down! This battle is over, we - **I** have lost." Chika ordered her remaining troops.

What was left of the Leanbox army carefully walked over to Chika and took up position behind her.

"You will hold here until I dismiss you." The god ordered Chika and her soldiers.

Chika nodded in response, waiting for the chance to return home.

"Guess your time out cold has literally cooled your head." Grey Heart smirked as he brought his communicator up to his mouth. "Grey Heart to Brodrick. Come in General."

 _"Loud and clear, my Lord."_

"General, would you be so kind as to do a little favour for me. I would like you to bring the goddess of Leanbox to the command bunker as I have...something I think she should hear."

 _"...Yes, my Lord. I shall make contact when everything is ready here. Brodrick out."_

* * *

Vert lay on her bed in her cell, worrying about the sounds she had heard earlier. The rumbling of a number of large vehicles heading off into the distance at night did not seem anything particularly worthy or note until the other Neptune had commented that there had been nothing like this before during her captivity before Vert had arrived. While Vert had tried to pass it off as Neptune merely trying to make conversation, the more the goddess thought about it, the more ominous things seemed to be. With Neptune now seemingly fast asleep, there wasn't much Vert could do to pry any more out of her, not that Vert suspected there would be any other knowledge she could gain.

The door to the cell block creaked open and the sound of multiple pairs of feet marching down the corridor broke the train of thought in Vert's mind, and awoke the sleeping Neptune.

"Ooooh! Is someone here for a late night rendezvous?" Neptune asked loudly as she jumped out of her bed and ran over to her cell door.

There was no response to Neptune, which made her pout and huff at being ignored. The soldiers, five of them in total plus an officer, stopped outside Vert's cell and the cell door was unlocked.

"My, why am I being visited by a number of soldiers this late at night for? Have you finally decided to show your true selves and defile me while your 'master' is not around?" Vert's voice was cold and as unfriendly as she could make it.

"Nothing like that, I assure you, goddess of Leanbox." General Brodrick stepped forwards into Vert's cell. "We pride ourselves on acting appropriately and following the commands of our 'master', as you refer to him, to the letter."

"Then your business here is of some other important matter if you are here at this time of night. Perhaps it is connected to that heavy rumbling earlier of vehicles moving?"

"Spread out and be prepared." Brodrick told the soldiers.

The soldiers gave themselves room as they took their laser rifles off their shoulders and aimed them at Vert.

"Whoa! Whoa! Hey, don't kill Miss Busty, guys! Please? For little 'ol me?" Neptune flailed her arms as she pleaded.

There was a groan from the General while Vert shook her head.

"Lord Grey Heart has requested that I escort you to the command bunker. I will ask that you refrain from any poorly conceived escape attempts, it will make things run smoother for all parties involved." Brodrick explained as he motioned for Vert to follow him.

Vert eyed all of the soldiers before exhaling through her nostrils. She knew she was in no place to even consider a successful escape with her powers suppressed, so playing along is all she could do. In any case, it would give her the chance to see a rough layout of her locale with her own eyes. She swung her legs off the bed and stood up before exiting her cell at a slower-than-normal pace to show obedience to the General's suggestion.

The group, though, only made it five paces before a voice behind them piped up.

"Hey! Can I come too? Pretty please?! I've been a **really** good girl lately! You won't hear a thing out of me, it'll be like I'm not there at all...erm...yeah, bad choice of words there...Of course I'll actually BE there, and not making any escape attempts. I learned my lesson 'bout that already. PLEASE! It's soooo boring here when no-one wants to play any games with me!" Neptune pleaded as she gripped two of the cell bars as hard as she could.

There was an audible, tired sigh from the General as he rolled his eyes and pondered the situation. Bringing her along would mean that she'll be less noisy and irritating for the next three or four days, but Lord Grey Heart's orders only stated that Vert was to be brought along, plus another person to keep an eye on increased the chance of the unforeseen happening...

"Please, please pleaseeeeeeee!" Neptune fake sobbed.

"For the love of- FINE! Andrews, unlock her cell and take point behind her." Brodrick ordered, surrendering to the annoying pleas of the other captive.

As the soldier retrieved the key to Neptune's cell, General Brodrick spoke directly to Neptune.

"I do NOT want to hear a peep out of you when we are in the bunker and you will stay within my line of sight at ALL times there. You know what fate awaits you should you cause mischief."

Neptune vigorously nodded her head. As her cell was unlocked and the door creaked open, she burst out and jumped into the air.

"WOO! Freedom! I'm finally free from that cell!"

However, one sharp look from Brodrick made Neptune immediately quiet down, and she gave a nervous glance down the corridor behind her where the solitary cell was located.

 _'Hmm, I wonder if we should have this solitary confinement cell for our Neptune.'_ Vert pondered as the group left the prison block for the command bunker.

* * *

A few minutes after leaving the jail, the group arrived at the command bunker. The narrow entrance was the most likely place for any hashed together escape attempt to occur given how easily it would have been for Neptune or Vert to overpower a single guard, grab their rifle and hold the General hostage or fight their way out. But, with one guard walking backwards, slowly, with his rifle aimed at Vert and the others standing outside with theirs aimed in at Neptune, and the General himself holding his own laser pistol in his hand to act as a further deterrent, there was no ill advised escape, just some complaining from the two prisoners about the necessity of the weapons aimed at them.

Vert looked around at the heart of the god's centre of operations, noting the various computers with readouts on them and the staff manning them. This area was built for functionality rather than looks and it looked like it could use an upgrade given the dated looks on some of the equipment.

"My Lord, I have delivered the goddess of Leanbox as requested." Brodrick said into the microphone used for communications.

 _"Excellent. Goddess Vert, I shall not beat about the bush here, there has been an attempt to rescue you tonight - I'm certain you are smart enough to have had suspicions of something going on - by your infantry. I'll be blunt with you; most of them are dead and what happens to the rest of them now depends on you."_

Vert's eyes widened at hearing this, with anger and rage starting to flow through her body and mind. Keeping her emotions in check would be a difficult task for her to do.

"You killed my soldiers in cold blood?! You expect-"

 _"I expect you to listen to me!"_ The god cut Vert off. _"I did not kill your soldiers in cold blood, they were all KIA. Do not forget, goddess, that people who join their nation's armed forces must expect that the possibility of having their lives ended early is very much a real chance! If your followers are not willing to accept that outcome, then one must question their loyalty to their nation."_

The scowl on Vert's face said more than any words would, not that her expressions could be seen by the god. What irked her the most was the fact he was right; the soldiers of Leanbox, or any nation for that matter, are there to keep the nation secure from outside threats at the potential risk of their lives. Death in service is not something that is nice to think about, but Vert had always offered a larger sum of financial compensation to the families of the deceased soldiers.

 _"Of course, arguing with you is not the reason I had you brought to my Command Bunker. I'm certain you will be interested to know that, on her knees in front of me, your hot-headed Oracle would like to speak to you."_

"CHIKA!"

 _"Vert...I..."_ There was a long pause from Chika.

"CHIKA! Are you alright?!" Vert asked in a panicked voice.

 _"I messed up so much this time...I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry, Vert."_

Chika's pained voice filled Vert's ears and made the goddess worry about her. Everyone knows Chika's reputation and Vert can tell within one syllable or one action if Chika is acting up.

"If you hurt just one hair on her head, I'll make you regret ever setting foot on my world!" Vert threatened the god, pointing her index finger at the microphone, despite the fact there was no video feed for him to see her.

Several clicking sounds brought Vert back to the realisation of exactly where she was and her current predicament as the guards all raised their rifles and aimed them at Vert. Even General Brodrick aimed his own pistol at her as well.

 _"Well, goddess, I will offer you a chance to send your remaining soldiers back home with their tails firmly between their legs. No more blood need be spilled this day."_

"And what, pray tell, must I do?" Vert asked.

 _"You see, I plan a national address to formally announce my arrival to the people of this world. In my address I think it would be...good of you to...pledge your allegiance to me. I know you will hate the idea, but I'm not ASKING you to like it. If you find you cannot make the pledge, then, I'm afraid I cannot guarantee the safety of your remaining infantry - Chika included."_

The scowl only intensified as Vert thought. She eyed each person in the bunker in turn as she desperately tried to think of a way to deny the god and ensure the safety of her army. In the end, though, there was nothing she could really do - just pick one of the two options available to her.

"I..." She took a deep breath. "Fine. Well played, god, I will offer you my services in exchange for my army's freedom to return home. However, I demand that the bodies of the deceased be returned to Leanbox for burial."

 _"Excellent. And, of course, I shall see to it that the dead be returned home. We shall discuss the details of that matter in due course. For now, though...All forces, STAND DOWN. All Mantas return to hangar! Major Mason, all Valiants: return to base!_ Epsilon: _return to base! General, please escort Lady Vert back to her cell."_ Grey Heart issued his commands. _"All Leanbox forces, your goddess has ensured your survival. All of you may now return home to lick your wounds."_

 _"NO! Vert! Don't do it! Don't surrend-"_ Chika's voice was cut off as the transmission ended.

"Stand down." Brodrick ordered the soldiers. "It seems, goddess of Leanbox, that we shall be working together from now on. Take her and Neptune back to their respective cells."

"Don't count on my assistance for too long, now will you?" Vert sneered as the two women were led out of the bunker.

Brodrick sighed as the two captives were returned to their cells. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the whole situation was that Neptune was completely quiet for the whole time, she didn't even react when everyone took aim at Vert.

* * *

Meanwhile, on the battlefield, the tanks had left to return to their base and the jets returned to the carrier. Grey Heart remained, aiming his rifle at Chika, who was still on her knees, until the remnants of her army had left.

"On your way, Oracle. You had best prepare yourself for the fallout that my national address will create in your nation. Make sure you remember that your beloved _goddess_ is now my servant because of YOU, and that she was forced into this situation due to YOUR own stupidity. I may let her keep you on, if she wants."

Chika completely blanked the god as she slowly trudged her way back to the landing craft. Her mind was reeling from everything that had happened and how it had gone so horribly wrong. Everything she thought about came to the same conclusion - she had royally screwed up and Vert, with Leanbox itself in due course, paying the price for Chika's rash actions.

Mission: Rescue Vert.

Outcome: FAIL - Vert still captive.

To Be Continued...


End file.
